How to Train your Mou hitori no Boku
by DarkValkyriaJ
Summary: Welcome to Domino. It's 9 days east of Snap and a few degrees west of Poker. It's located solidly on the meridian of Card Games. Constantly being attacked by Spirits, most people would leave. Not Us. We're duelists; we have trouble dealing with defeat.
1. Welcome to my Life

**Disclaimer: I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh or How to Train your Dragon.**

* * *

Welcome to Domino. Its 9 days east of Snap and a few degrees west of Poker. It's located solidly on the meridian of Card Games. My city. In a word, dull. It's been here for over 5 generations, sure everything is new. Furniture, houses, jewellery but most importantly...Duel Monsters. We have battles, challenges and a great town-wide competition. The only problems here are the crimes. You see, most places have attention seeking teens or drug dealers. We have... Millennium Spirits. Most people would leave. Not Us. We're duelist; we have trouble dealing with defeat.

My name is Yugi. Great name, I know. But it's not the worst. Parents believe a hideous name will frighten off Watapon and Marshmallon. Like our charming duelist personalities wouldn't do that.

"Yugi! What are you doing out?"

"Get inside!"

I know, our neighbours aren't all that nice...but it's routine. Spirits attack, everyone rushes to chase them away, Yugi gets locked in his room. I run towards the roads to help but someone grabs my jacket collar, just in time to save me from a Malik's dagger.

"YUGI! What is he doing...? What are you doing out? Get inside!"

That's Solomon the Great, owner of the blue-eyes. Now, just so where on the same level here, we summon monsters from cards to protect the city from spirits. Life points represent our life energy. Run out, you die. Got that? Cool. Where were we? Ohh, Solomon the Great. They say when he was a baby, he took a Spirit's monster and wiped out the spirits remaining life points. Do I believe it? Yes, I do.

"What have we got?"

"Marik's, Bakura's, Dartz. Wheeler saw a Kisara."

"Any Pharaoh's?"

"None so far."

"Good."

I ran to the fort- AKA Card Restock and Medicine. In the distance I heard someone shout 'Activate the duelling Arena'. Massive stadiums slowly rose off the ground, each with one duelist and a backup in them.

"Nice of you to join the party. I thought you'd lost a duel."

"Who, me? No, come on, I'm way too good for them to beat. They wouldn't know what to do if they challenged me."

"They need practice dummies, don't they?"

The smart-ass with a loud mouth and the creator of Duel monsters is Pegasus. I've been his apprentice ever since I was small. Well...smaller.

"Move to the trap cards. We'll counter attack with Horn of Heaven."

Solomon's gruff yet booming voice made its way over the crowd, even as a Spirit took someone's jewels and another used Dark Necrofear to alight someone's home. See? Old village, lots of new stuff.

"Miho's place is on fire!"

"Come 'on gang! Let's go!"

The gang as they call themselves consist of Joey, Anzu, the twins: Tristan and Duke...and Seto Kaiba. Top teen duellists on the island. They have it soo much better than I do. I try to crawl out the window to help, but a certain one-eyed nutcase stops me.

"No, No Yugi-boy."

"Come on. Let me out, please. I need to make my mark."

"You've made plenty of marks, all on the wrong cards. Like that time you combined Winged Kuriboh and Watapon. What you call it? Hanewoota?"

"It was Hanewata and please, only two minutes. I'll kill a spirit; my life will get infinitely better. I might even get a ranking."

"You can't use spell cards. You don't have a deck,"

"Do so!"

"You don't have a good deck. You can't even summon a monster." Yugi was ready for this, it was the same argument every attack.

"True, but this will summon them for me."

Yugi made the mistake of bringing out his smaller, light weight version of Kaiba's famous duel disk. Placing a card in attack mode, Yugi cringed as a Dark Magician appeared and attacked an unsuspecting duelist. The said duelist fell to the ground, unconscious but not dead...thankfully.

"See? Now this right here is what I'm talking about!"

"Mild command issues..."

"YUGI! If you ever want to get out there to duel Millennium Spirits you need to stop all...this." Yugi rolled his eyes.

"You just gestured to all of me."

"YES! That's it! Stop being all of you."

"Ooo..."

"Oh, yes."

"You sir, are playing a dangerous game. Keeping this much raw duelist contained? There will be consequences!"

"I'll take my chances. Fort. Medicine. Now!"

One day, I'll get out there. Because killing a spirit is everything around here. A Marik's deck is sure to at least get me noticed. Bakura's are tough, almost unlimited summoning power. Defeating one of them would probably get me a good ranking. Dartz, brute force, twice the status. And then there's Kisaras, only the best duelist challenge those. They have this nasty habit of summoning only Lv. 8 or higher monsters. But the ultimate prize is the Millennium Spirit no one's ever seen. We call it...

"Pharaoh! EVERYONE GET DOWN!"

This spirit never steals items of value, never shows itself and never EVER forgets where our strongest cards are kept. With unmatched speed, even if you did catch up to it Pharaoh's can shape shift into monsters in their deck. No one has ever been able to kill a Pharaoh, that's why I'm gonna be the first.

"Man the fort, Yugi. They need me out there." Pegasus grabbed an original duel disk and ran to the door before stopping. "Stay. Put. There. You know what I mean." Sure I did...

"Where are you going?"

"YUGI!"

"Be right back." I ran with my duel disk attached to my arm through various crowds, listening to the destruction the spirits caused.

Solomon the Great activated Nightmare's Steelcage and caught 3 Marik's.

"Let's get them!"

"Mind yourselves." Solomon spoke not a moment too soon as one Marik summoned Revival Jam. "These devils still have some juice in them."

I kept running till I came to a large, seemingly quiet hill. Quickly drawing 5 cards, I remembered to breathe. The life point counter beeped announcing I had 4000 life points and I grinned. Good hand, now...

"Come 'on. I just need someone to challenge."

I waited, and waited, and waited... and nothing. I stood there for what felt like forever, which was really 2 minutes, when a faint line appeared in the sky. Looking at it, I reasiled people only ever saw these just before a Pharaoh attacked! If I could get it...

"I activate Spellbinding Circle!"

The spell appeared but I had to make an important decision that could change my life. Left or Right? I stood there thinking of the possibilities when I realised the trail was almost gone. In a mad panic, I yelled the first that came to my mind.

"RIGHT!"

The spell flew through the night air towards the right of the trail. I stood there fingers crossed as the sand came to a stop, followed by the trail plummeting to earth. A loud crash rang out, and my mind took no more than 5 seconds to realise what happened.

"I hit it. YES, I HIT IT! Did anybody see that?" I turned fully unaware of the Kisara spirit behind me, with a massive Blue Eyes White Dragon it had summoned, until the dragons hot breath went down my neck.

"Except for you." The Blue-Eyes aimed white lightning at me and I screamed before doing what any person would to. Screamed more and ran.

Solomon had just finished tying up a group of Bakura's as he heard screaming. He turned, to meet with the sight of me running for my life, the Kisara and its Dragon still hot on my tail. Sighing, he knew he would have to save me...again.

"Do NOT let them escape!"

"Right."

I continued to run for my sweet life.

Mistake No. 2, don't run to town while being chased by a dragon. Leaping of buildings, the Kisara shot multiple beams of white lightning at me and I hid behind a large metal poll. Had I looked up, I would have seen it was a stadium foundation. White lightning shot at me and split either side of the poll, saving my life. The foundation cracked with electricity as I looked left. The dragons head appeared to my right and would've easily wiped out my life points if it hadn't been for Solomon, who appeared out of nowhere and summoned an Ancient Dragon. The beasts engaged in battle, but Blue Eyes was stronger. It cost Solomon 200 life points, but the Kisara flew off with its dragon deeply wounded. Ohh, and there's one more thing you need to know.

I watched as the stadium poll gave way and fell to the ground, large amounts of metal crumbling away and rolling downhill. I cringed at every crash and scream.

"Sorry, Grandpa."

Had I followed the sound of destruction I would've seen a scarp cut of metal destroy the Nightmare's Steelcage the Mariks were in , but I did see the threesome run off with someone's duel disk and a bag most likely filled with gold and other semi-precious stones. I turned to Grandpa.

"O.K., but I hit a Pharaoh." Grandpa grabbed me by the collar and led be towards the house. "It's not like the last few times, Grandpa! I really, actually hit it! You guys were busy. I had a very clear shot. It went down off Harpies point. Let's get a search party..."

"STOP! Just stop. Every time you step outside, disaster follows! Can you not see that I have bigger problems? Winter is almost here and I have an entire city to supply! With Spirits taking our cards more and more, I need to keep these decks full!"

"Between you and me, the city could do with a few less decks."

"This isn't a joke, Yugi! Why can't you follow the simplest command?"

"I can't stop myself. I see a spirit and I have to just... defeat it. It's who I am, Grandpa."

"You're many things, Yugi. But a top duelist is not one of them. Get back to the house. Make sure he gets there. I have his mess to clean up." Pegasus stepped forward and led me home while Grandpa walked away in the other direction.

"Quite the Performance." That was Duke.

"I've never seen anyone mess up that badly. That helped!" Joey, rubbing it in my face, as usual.

"Thank you, thank you. I was trying." The gang never missed an opportunity to hang shit on me. I kept walking as Pegasus pushed Duke out of the way.

"I really did hit one, Pegasus."

"Sure you did Yugi-boy."

"He NEVER listens."

"It runs in the family."

"When he does, it's with this disappointed scowl, like someone gave him the wrong booster pack." Doing my best old person voice, I mimicked Grandpa.

"Excuse me, employee. You brought me the wrong grandson. I ordered a handsome boy with a duel disk, brilliant deck and master talent on the side. This here, this is a talking behind of a Dark Clown."

"HEY! I like Peten the Dark Clown for your information! Anyway, you are thinking about this wrong. It's not so much what you look like; it's what's inside that he can't stand."

"Thank you, for summing that up." I was about to walk inside when Pegasus stopped him.

"Look, the point is, stop trying so hard to be something you're not."

"I just wanna be one of you guys." I walked inside and heard Pegasus sigh. As he turned to leave, I ran out the back door. I had a Millennium Spirit to find.

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**CODH: If I get 1 review, I'll continue**

**Yami Bakura: What's the point?**

**CODH: It's FUN**

**Ryou: Now...whoever's reading this (Yeah YOU) Follow the magic arrow and click. PLEASE I'M BEGGING YOU**

**CODH: If you review I'll bring Ryou into the story**

**Ryou: PLEASE REVIEW!**

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**V**


	2. Harpies Point

**Disclaimer: I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh or How to Train a Dragon**...**but I wish I did :(**

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Back in Domino, things weren't going to well. Everyone was crowded round a small table, Grandpa at the head.

"Either we finish them of they'll finish us. If we find their lair and destroy it, the Spirit's will find another home."

"One more search before the Battle city tournament begins. WE NEED THOSE CARDS BACK!"  
"But people that come out never come back! Only empty duel disk..."  
"WE'RE DUELIST! It's an occupational hazard! Now...who's with ME?"

"Fine...those who stay can watch over Yugi." All hands shot up. "That's better."

The crowd left, leaving Solomon and Pegasus, who was going through his toon deck.

"Well...I'll pack my Toon World card."

"No, I need you to stay and train some of the newer duelist."

"Great! And, while I'm with the kids Yugi-boy can run the fort. Blank cards, polymerization, lots of time to himself. What could possibly go wrong?"

"What am I going to do with him, Pegasus? What CAN I do?"

"Put him in training."

"No, I'm serious."

"So am I!"

" He'd be killed before you put on your duel disk."

"You don't know that."

"Actually, I do."

"No you don't."

"I do."

"No you DON'T!"

"You know what he's like, from the time he could crawl he's been...different! He doesn't listen; he had the attention span of a marshmallon. "

Having heard the story millions of times, Pegasus just sat there let Solomon continue his rant. He quickly ducked to pick up a Toon Dark Magician Girl he dropped, not that Grandpa would've noticed.

"I try teaching him about traps cards, and he goes hunting for Kuriboh!"

"Kuriboh exist! They steal your weaker cards, but only on Wednesdays. What's with that?"

"When I was younger-"

"Here we go."

"My father told me to go challenge the nearest Spirit. It was a Bakura, and I thought he was crazy but I did it. Do you know what happened?"

"You got your ass kicked."

"I defeated it within 5 turns. It showed me what a duelist could do Pegasus. If he tried, he could win any duel, against _any_ spirit. Ever since I was little I knew who I was, what I had to become. Yugi is not that boy."

" You can't stop him Solomon, you can only prepare him. I know it seems hopeless, but the fact is you can't always be around to protect him. He will get out there again; he's probably out there right now!"

And I was. Grabbing my notepad I crossed out another area on my sketch of harpies point...which basically left me with an island of crosses.

"Stupid, stupid, STUPID!" Giving up, I threw the book over my shoulder. "The gods hate me. Some people lose a monster reborn, or some people lose a final countdown. But I manage to lose a complete spirit! ARGH!" In fury, I hit a low hanging branch...of course it came back and hit my eye. "Ouch...What?" Looking up, I found out why it was that low...The whole branch was hanging loosely, completely snapped. Following down the branch, I saw a fair sized trench that continued out of sight. Gasping, I slowly slid into it.

There were twigs and upturned roots sticking out everywhere, sheer destruction. Slowly, I came to a rise in the soil. Hesitantly... I looked over the mound, and just as quickly ducked back down. There was something there. I looked over, and after noting that whoever...or whatever it was was out cold. I summoned my Dark Magician just in case, and walked closer to the creature. Ducking behind a bolder, I looked and saw it was lying in the soil...apparently unconscious.

"Wow, I...I did it! I did it! Ohh...this fixes everything. YES!"

I grinned, lifting my leg onto the creature's chest. "I have brought down this mighty beast!"

"You always step on people when there unconscious?" I jumped back, screaming. The pharaoh looked unconscious, but I swore I heard _something._ I switched my dark magician to attack mode and proceeded with caution. The pharaoh looked human in appearance, wearing what looked like blue leather. Its hair was tri-coloured, and stuck out in a star-like shape

_He looks like me...No, that's just freaky coincidence_

I finally came to its face. My amethyst eyes locked with crimson. It raised its head, looking directly into my eyes. I took a deep breath and exhaled, remembering what I was here to do.

"I'm going to kill you, spirit. Then, I'm going to steal your deck and take it to my grandfather. I am a duelist." I looked it straight in the eyes. "I am a duelist!" My dark magician, sensing my objective, raised its staff, ready for attack. The spirit lowered its head again, resting against the soil, and closing its eyes. It looked so expectant, so ready to die. The dark magician, looking slightly confused, lowered its staff. Looking at me questionably, he awaited command. I glanced around me, studying the scene, when it dawned on me. In horror I stepped backwards.

"I did this." I was about to turn around and leave, but stopped. _Someone else will find it eventually. _I looked back to the creature, knowing there was only one thing to do.

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**CODH: *gasp* He's gonna kill him**

**Yami Bakura: It would do everyone a favour**

**Ryou: You said you'd bring me into the story**

**CODH: Yeah...sorry?**

**Ryou: GET ME IN THE STORY!**

**CODH: You'll be in it...eventually**

**Ryou: You're impossible**

**CODH: Peeps, sorry for not updating...I've been out of town and lack of internet made it hard**

**Yami Bakura: If you _still_ want her to continue this story, please review to let us know**


	3. OneSided Conversation

**Disclaimer: *sighs* Still own nothing...**

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My eyes shot open. I felt that stupid spellbinding circle fading, my arms fell limp on the ground. And the second they did, I used them to push myself up and tackle the kid. He was pushed against the ground, eyes wide in fright. _Bet you didn't expect that one_. Reaching for my deck, I picked up the top card. I threw it with force and it landed in the soil next to his head. The card stuck out of the dirt like a knife. His eyes followed the card, then back to lock with mine. I smirked, never before had I seen anyone so terrified.

"Take that back to your Gramps." The kid just stood there terrified while I ran off, ignoring the cuts and bruises on my arms and legs.

**-~Yugi POV~-**

I lay there, shocked by what I'd just seen. Slowly, I sat up panting. The card fell and I carefully picked it up. Turning it over, I saw it looked like a brown fur ball, at the top it's name written in clear black ink. _Kuriboh_. Still clutching the card in my hand, I managed to stand up using the bolder for support. I saw the spirit run off and shakily I walked about 5 steps before the ground zoomed up and everything went black.

* * *

It was night when I eventually got home. Grandpa was sitting by the fireplace, putting on an extra piece of wood. I shut the door as quietly as possible and tip-toed over to the stairs leading to my room. I was almost at the top when.

"Yugi."

I froze. "Grandpa, ahh... I need to talk to you."

"I need to speak with you too, Yugi." We both started talking at the exact same time.

"I don't want to duel the Millenium spirits."

"It's time for you to learn how to duel millenium spirits."

"What?" Neither of us had heard each other. "You go first." I finished climbing down the stairs before responding.

"No, you go first."

Grandpa sat down on his chair. "Alright. You get your wish, Duelist training. You start in the morning." I gasped and stepped back.

"Oh, man...I should've gone first. Because... I was thinking, you know we have plenty of good duelist on the island, but do we have enough bread making duelist or small home repair duelist?" Grandpa completely ignored me, handing me a duel disk that was way to big.

"You'll need this." A look of horror dawned on my face

"I don't want to duel millenium spirits." Grandpa only chuckled before walking off.

"Yes you do." I followed him, struggeling not to drop the duel disk.

"Re-phrase. Grandpa, I can't duel spirits."

"But you will duel spirits." Almost dropping the duel disk again, I replied.

"No, I am very extra sure that I won't." Grandpa turned to me.

"It's time, Yugi." I just looked at him miserably.

"Can you not hear me?"

"This is serious Yugi. When you us ethis duel disk, you carry all us with it. Which means you walk like us, talk like us..and think like us. No more of, this." I sighed, rolling my eyes.

"You just gestured to all of me."

"Deal?"

"This conversation is very one sided." Grandpa's voice rose.

"Deal?" I sighed, there was no point in arguing.

"Deal." Picking up his own duel disk, Grandpa nodded...heading towards the door.

"Good. Train hard. I'll be back...probably." I sighed.

"And I'll be here...Maybe." Grandpa left, leaving me standing alone still holding the oversized duel disk.

* * *

**CODH: That was waaaaaay too short, I'll make up for it in the next chapter**

**Ryou: -_-**

**CODH: Next chapter...I think**

**Ryou: Why do I bother?**

**CODH: Cus once you are in it you're awesome**

**Yami Bakura: Whenever she says awesome, someone's gonna die**

**Ryou: *gulp* Reveiws?  
**


	4. Duelist Training

**Disclaimer: I own nothing**

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"Welcome to Duel training."

Pegasus opened the large stadium and Kaiba walked forward, followed by Joey, Anzu, Duke and Tristan. I followed behind. Duke was the first to comment...of course.

"I hope I get some serious damage." Tristan agreed, in his own way.

"I want to see some real traps...like Nightmare Wheel or Acid Hole."

"It's only a challenge if your life points hit under 500." Kaiba smirked. I rolled my eyes.

"Yeah, no kidding right? Near death experience, Love it." Duke groaned.

"Oh great, who let him in?" Pegasus interrupted.

"Let's get started! The duelist who does best will get the honour of defeating there first spirit in front of the entire island."

Joey raised his hand. "Um, Yugi already beat a Pharaoh, so...does that disqualify him or something?" The gang walked off, talking among themselves. Pegasus tried to cheer me up with one of his famous pep talks.

"Don't worry. You're small and weak, that'll make you less of a target. They'll see you as sick and pointless, and go after the stronger looking duelist." Yeah...Pegasus should stick with his day job.

"Sorry I'm late." Everyone turned to see a white-haired boy run through the doors, holding a duel disk. Pegasus sighed.

"Honestly Ryou-boy. Duelist, this is Ryou...he's new to Domino. I want you to make him feel right at home." Ryou walked over to me and held out a hand. "Hi, I'm Ryou." I accepted the hand and shook back.

"Yugi. Yugi Mutou." Pegasus cleared his throat.

"In these cages are just some of the many millennium spirits you will learn to duel." Walking along, Pegasus motioned to each cage, before naming the creature inside. "The deadly Dartz." Anzu started to comment on every spirit.

"Sounds awful."

"The Monstrous Bakura."

"Absolutely Scary!"

"The hideous Gozaburo."

"I'm scared."

"The savage Kisara."

"Save me Kaiba!" Pegasus rolled his eye.

"Would you shut up? And finally, the Marik." Pegasus grinned a little too happy and pulled a key from his pocket. Joey saw the key and ran forward.

"Wait, aren't you gonna teach us first?" Pegasus grin only widen.

"I believe in learning on the job." Pegasus unlocked the cage, and stepped aside. Everyone tensed as boy walked out, looking at the ground. He looked normal enough, and I heard Ryou sigh in relief next to me...but if I learned anything over the years it was never underestimate a spirit. The Marik grinned and suddenly summoned a Helpoemer. Everyone ran as Pegasus shouted over Anzu's screaming.

"Today's lesson is about survival. If he attacks you...you're dead. Now, what's the first thing you're gonna need?" Everyone started shouting random answers.

"A doctor?"

"An ambulance?" Kaiba rolled his eyes and answered.

"A deck." Pegasus grinned.

"Your decks, grab them!" Everyone ran over to a wall covered in deck holders. "You're most important piece of equipment is your deck. If you must ever choose between a deck or a duel disk, take the deck!" Everyone grabbed their decks and summoned a random monster, but Duke and Tristan had some trouble.

"That's my deck, Melon head!"

"Is not Dice boy!"

"Yours is over there, with the pink case. You like pink." Tristan growled

"You baka!" While the duo fought, the Helpoemer had approached them. It attacked but Tristan managed to summon a Shovel Crusher to defend himself, Duke summoning a Yaranzo. Both monsters were destroyed, but were in defence mode so the twins suffered no damage.

"Duke! Tristan! You're out!" The pair ran for cover as Pegasus continued his 'lesson'. "Decks are good for two things. Defending and attacking. As long as you monster has more attack points than the opponents, the opposing monster will be destroyed. Each spirit has a limited level strength of summoning. What's the strongest level a Marik can summon?"

"Level 4?"

"No, 5!"

"Correct." The Helpoemer attacked Anzu's Happy Lover, ultimately destroying the weaker monster. Pegasus sighed.

"You're out Anzu!" The said girl ran off screaming. The Helpoemer chased her around while the Marik laughed insanely.

"Yugi, get out there!" I tried getting out of a gap between the cage and the wall, but the Helpoemer attacked and forced be back in. Getting bored, the Marik commanded the monster to go after Kaiba and Joey.

"I finally moved out of my old man's place, you should come over sometime." While Joey was distracted, Kaiba ran out of the way as the Helpoemer attacked and destroyed Joey's Flame Swordsman.

"Wheeler, you're done!" Kaiba ran towards me, constantly looking between the Marik and its Helpoemer.

"So, just you and me?" Kaiba, cold as ever, replied.

"Nope, just you." Kaiba ran off again and the Helpoemer aimed at me. The attack hit my Giant Soldier of Stone, which had an equal number of defence points, so both monsters we're destroyed. But before I could summon another monster, the Marik summoned a bistro butcher. It was about to attack when suddenly a Dark Ruler Ha Des appeared, blocking the attack and destroying the bistro butcher. While the Marik was recovering from the attack Pegasus managed to lock it back in the cage. Everyone was thinking the same thing. _'Where did that Dark Ruler come from?' _

"Yugi, are you okay?" Ryou ran out from behind the other side of the cage. He lent over me and offered a hand. I accepted and he helped me up.

"Ryou, did you see-" The light bulb suddenly went off in my head. "You summoned The Dark Ruler Ha Des, didn't you?"

"Um...yeah. I saw the Bistro Butcher and...yeah."

"Yugi-boy! Still in one piece?" I rolled my eyes.

"Yes Pegasus." The said man looked around the stadium.

"Who summoned the Dark Ruler?" Ryou took a deep breath.

"Me, sir." Pegasus whirled round to look at Ryou.

"Well then, Yugi-boy here owes you one big thanks. That attack would have wiped out the rest of his life points." I nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, thanks Ryou."

"You would have done the same for me."

"Yeah!"

"Let this be a lesson to you all." Pegasus turned to me and wagged his finger like I was a bad child. "A spirit will always, _always_ go for the kill."

* * *

**CODH: 3 chapters on one night!**

**Yami Bakura: And you're still awake**

**CODH: Too tired to go to sleep**

**Yami Bakura: That made no sense**

**Ryou: Who cares? I'm finally in the story!**

**CODH: See? I told you I would do it eventually**

**Yami Bakura: And now we're veering off the actual How to Train a Dragon plot**

**CODH: Meh, we'll see what the readers say about it**

**Ryou: REVEIW! Please *puppy-dog eyes***


	5. Close Encounters of the 2nd Kind

"So why didn't you?" I was back at Harpies point, in the clearing I found the pharaoh in to be exact. I studied the ground where the spirit had been lying, damage still evident from when he had jumped me.

"_A spirit will always, always go for the kill." _I sighed... "Then why aren't I dead?" As I stood up about to leave, something glittered out the corner of my eye.

"What?" I walked over to the object, half covered in soil. Brushing it off, I realised it was a piece of what appeared it be solid gold, a creepy eye engraved in the middle.

_This looks like only a small piece, maybe a puzzle. _I lifted it up, when another piece shined in the sun a few metres off. I walked over and grabbed it. Scanning the area, I saw that there were heaps of pieces, leading off like a trail of bread crumbs. Carefully, I followed the path picking up each piece along the way.

It eventually led me to a clearing. Sunlight spilled threw the thick canopy of the beautiful green weeping willow trees. Clear water flowed into a small lake, with a variety of fish swimming in the sparkling fresh water. Erosion had left it all in what looked like a hollowed out bowl with 10 metre high walls of solid rock. I was lucky I found the path near the bottom because even some of the best would have trouble climbing up. And if they fell down...

A bloody jacket lay near my feet. I knelt down and studied the blue leather, when a winged shadow passed over me followed by an ear-wrenching scream. I quickly dove back into the safety of the covered path. Looking up I saw a curse of dragon, desperately trying to climb up the cliff face. The creature was covered in cuts and bruises, slowly sliding back down to the ground. Just as I thought the dragon was going to fall to its death, it stretched out its wings and glided back to the ground. I was amazed, even injured the dragon was one of the most beautiful creatures I'd ever seen.

Picking my way carefully, I half climbed, half skid towards another large rock jutting out from the cliff. I lay down against the rock so I wouldn't be so obvious and watched the creature. The dragon slithered towards a fallen log and climbed onto it. Using its body in a spring like movement, it opened its wings and flew a few metres off the ground before nearly colliding with a cliff wall, turning too sharply to avoid the wall and as a result crashing back to the ground. It tried to climb up once more, but appeared to give up, lying motionless on the soil. A bright glow filled the clearing and I tightly shut my eyes to protect them from the light. When I opened them and looked back, the dragon was gone.

Instead a boy was lying there, breathing heavily. It took me less than a second to recognise it was the pharaoh. Taking advantage of the once in a life-time situation, I grabbed my notebook and quickly drew a rough sketch of the spirit. It was still wearing the blue leather pants from the first time we met. The only notable differences were more cuts and bruises, and the fact the blue jacket that it was wearing the first time I had found discarded on the path. Instead, the spirit wore a black tang top. Actually, it didn't look to bad...

_Bad mind, stay on the task at hand._

I drew the brown rope that hang around the spirits neck leaving a gap at the bottom, expecting I'd have to draw some form of pendant. But after a second glance at the pharaoh, I realised there was nothing there. Just a ring of brown frayed rope. The pharaoh got up and winced, before limping over to the edge of the lake. Using its hands to scoop up water, it drank slowly. I frowned; a creature so amazing should never be so...helpless.

"Why not just...fly away?"

I sighed, letting my hand loosen its grip on the pen...a little too much. The pen slipped from my grasp and before I could catch it fell to the ground. The pharaoh saw it and looked up, right at me. I stood up and took a step back, afraid it was going to attack me again. But it just stood there, staring. I took a few more steps back, and when the pharaoh showed no signs of moving, I ran off as fast as my legs could carry me.

* * *

**CODH: THANKS FOR ALL THE REVEIWS! THEY'VE MADE ME SO VERY HAPPY :')**

**Yami Bakura: She hasn't shut up about it all week**

**Ryou: CODH does not own Yu-Gi-Oh or How to train a Dragon...Thank Ra**

**CODH: What 'cha mean by that?**

**Ryou: Nothing**

**CODH: Please review :D**


	6. A Little bit of a History Lesson

I walked up to the massive store. This was we're everything happened; tournaments, meetings. As I walked in, I could hear Pegasus giving everyone a theory lesson.

"All right, where did Kaiba go wrong in the ring today?"

"I summoned Mystic Horseman when I could've summoned Battle Ox for the same about of energy. It was stupid. The horseman was gone before I could even attack."

Tristan grunted. "Yeah, we noticed."

Joey was shocked. "No no, you we're great. That was so 'Kaiba'." Pegasus sighed.

"Kaiba's right. You need to be tough on yourselves. Where did Yugi go wrong?" Duke smirked.

"He showed up."

"He didn't get eaten." I just walked over to an empty table with a small plate of food, ignoring the comments. Kaiba glared at me.

"He's never where we should be."

"Thank you, Kaiba." Pegasus walked over to a massive book, picking it up and dropping on the table the others we're sitting at. "You need to live and breathe this stuff. The duelist monster guide. Everything we know about every millennium spirit we know of." While the others looked at the cover of the old book, Pegasus looked out one of the windows as thunder clapped overhead. "No attacks tonight. Study up." The silver haired man walked off, Tristan giving him a horrified look.

"Wait, you want us to read?" Duke was equally horrified.

"While we're still alive?" Joey punched the table.

"Why read words when you can just duel da stuff the words tell you 'bout?" Anzu joined the conversation, taking the book's side.

"I've read it seven times. There's this spirit that seals your soul in a card after it defeats you. And there's this other one that-" Duke cut in, bored already.

"Yeah. That sounds great. There was a chance I'd read it..."

"But now..." Tristan rolled his eyes as Joey stood up.

"You guys read. I'll go duel stuff." The gang walked off, splitting into their own conversations. Ryou and I were left sitting there, so I walked over to him.

"So...I guess we'll share?" Ryou smiled.

"Sure." I grinned, that was the first time someone had actually said yes. I opened the book to first chapter. "Alright, so Noa's can summon-"

"No higher than Level 4...with the exception of Shinato, King of a higher Plane."

"Which is a level 8 monster."

"With 3300 ATK points and 3000 DEF points." I laughed out loud.

"Is it just me, or did we just try to out-nerd each other?" Ryou laughed as the realisation hit him.

"I believe we just did." After we stopped laughing, I took the chance to find out about the creature that was currently stuck in a bowl of rock

"So...what do you know about Pharaohs?" Ryou's face grew solemn and he closed the book.

"I know about them. I've never actually seen one; but there cold, cruel, vile creatures and every last one of them should be wiped from this planet." I looked down to the cover of the book, knowing I'd probably regret what I was about to say.

"You sound like you speak from experience." Ryou looked away from me so I couldn't see his eyes.

"My mother and my little sister. They we're both killed by a pharaoh. They didn't do anything, people told me they were just on the wrong place at the wrong time." I felt my eyes tear up as I covered my mouth with my hand.

"I'm so sorry Ryou."

"It's alright Yugi. That's why I asked my dad if we could move here." Ryou looked right at me, and I swear I didn't recognise him. There was a murderous glint to his eyes, all traces of the gentle boy I knew gone. "If I ever find the pharaoh, I'm gonna kill it. Pure and simple, revenge."

I held my breath and tried not to look into those insane eyes. Ryou sighed, before putting on one of his signature smiles. "Sorry Yugi, but I best be off before my Dad worries." He stood up smiling, looking like old Ryou again. "Well, it was nice chatting with you. See ya tomorrow!" He walked towards the exit and waved. I waved back, since it was only polite and all.

"Yeah, see ya tomorrow." He shut the door, and I let out the breath I'd been holding in. "Okay, that was... terrifying." I looked around and noticed for the first time that while Ryou and I had been talking, everyone had left. I stood up and re-lit a few candles, before sitting back down with the book. Taking a few more deep breaths, I opened the book like it was a new chapter of my life.

"Spirit classifications. Level 4 or less, Level 8 or less, Level 10 plus..." I turned to the higher level monsters towards the end of the book.

"Rex Raptor. A more dim-witted spirit, a Rex Raptor relies on brute strength to attack. Most beginning duelist could defeat, but as all spirits remains a threat. Extremely dangerous, defeat on sight."

"Weevil Underwood. Preferring to hide in forest, this creature uses a deck made of stolen Bug-type cards. Most duelist crumble before the power of the Perfectly Ultimate Great Moth. Extremely dangerous, defeat on sight."

I kept reading, the fear in my voice slowly becoming more and more evident.

"Zigfriend von Schroeder. This solitary spirit is more interested in stealing money than cards. Wielding extremely powerful spell cards, this creature is very much capable of winning a duel in one turn. Extremely dangerous." Thunder rolled in the distance and I screamed, turning towards the door as lighting flashed temporarily lighting the room. Realising it was nothing to fear, I slowly turned back to the book.

"The Big 5. 5 individual creatures if cornered alone are considered fairly weak, but together extremely powerful. Defeat on sight." I flicked through the pages, the drawing of spirits seeming to come to life on the pages. "Marik. Bakura. The Seeker. Rafael. The Great Leviathan." My eyes widened in fear, and I turned the pages as fast as possible but still one of the more gruesome facts still seemed to jump out at me, and I couldn't help but say it aloud.

"Steals from victims. Stabs it victims. Tortures its victims. Trap its victim's souls in game pieces. Extremely dangerous, extremely dangerous. Defeat on sight, defeat on sight, defeat on sight!" Just as I was about to slam the book shut, a seemingly blank page came up. At first I thought it was an error, but looking at the top of the page I saw a single word printed in fine black ink.

"Pharaoh." I looked at the bottom of the page, and sure enough there was the information. "Strength unknown, summon level unknown. The unholy offspring of power and darkness itself. Never challenge this spirit. Your only chance: hide and pray it does not _find you_."

I reached into my pocket and pulled out my notepad. Opening to the page of my most recent sketch, I placed the book down in the large space under the title Pharaoh. The drawing sat slightly crooked on the near blank page like the pieces of a puzzle, only without a box to look at. I'd always liked puzzles...and even with all the terrifying stories about how dangerous the Pharaoh was, I looked forward to completing this one.

* * *

A group of large expensive looking boats slowly cut through the water. While most of them dragged behind the largest one, a fine white ship led the group...like a pack of wolves going in for the kill. A massive cloud of fog confronted the boats like solid brick, and the ships came to a stop a few metres away. Grandpa stood at a table on deck, closely studying a map of the known world.

"I can almost smell them. They're close." He turned towards the fog wall, only shown as a swirling grey mass on the map. "Steady!" The boats moved along the wall for a few more minutes, before Grandpa uttered 3 small words. "Take us in." Men started screaming orders around the grand boat.

"Hard to port! For the Devil's Gate."

"Hard to port!" All the ships turned and slowly moved into the thick of the fog. For a split second nothing could be seen or heard. A bright flash lit the sky and a dragon's shape could be seen in the fog, a small figure standing on the rocks duel-disk on arm close-by.

* * *

**CODH: I tried to make this chap longer to make up for the last one**

**Yami Bakura: You know the drill; we get down on our knees and beg for reviews**

**CODH: YES! Reviews make me happy, any and all kinds 3**

**Ryou: You work on next chapter while we beg for reviews**

**CODH: Aye aye Cap-i-tan *starts frantically typing***

**Ryou: Please review, her sanity is at stake  
**

**Yami Bakura: Yeah, I think all this fanfiction stuff has finally gone to her head**


	7. More Training

Today was another day of Pegasus a-grade teaching. The arena had been turned into a maze, full of wooden walls that reached high over our heads. If that wasn't enough, a fully armed Bakura was hiding somewhere within the walls, lurking around corners ready to attack any poor unfortunate victim, or what Pegasus called students.

I stopped in what seemingly safe place and looked up towards Pegasus, in one of the boxes just above the arena, watching us run around like lab rats while he sat on his fancy chair drinking a white wine spritzer. I honestly swear this guy's getting paid way too much for what he does...or what he doesn't do.

"Hey Pegasus, I just happened to notice the book had nothing on Pharaohs. Is there another book, or a sequel? Or maybe a little Pharaoh pamphlet?" A Dark Necrofear appeared out of nowhere and sent a sphere of black energy at me, hitting my duel disk and causing a few cards to fall out. I jumped, and Pegasus shouted at me.

"Focus Yugi-boy! You're not even trying!" A white haired creature walked around the corner and looked at me. At first I thought it was Ryou until I saw the sadistic grin written on its face. Ryou may had scared me last night, but I doubt even Anubis could pull off a look that evil.

I ran off forgetting the cards that had fallen, the spirit hot on my trail. Pegasus voice boomed over us, his sick twisted form of teaching.

"Today it's all about attack!"

I turned around and not seeing the creature I stopped to breathe. A shriek rang out overhead and I looked straight up. The Bakura was crouched on the maze wall in a cat-like position, at least five metres off the ground. It grinned at me mischievously and I had to resist screaming before running off. The walls creaked with the extra weight of the creature running on the tops.

"A Bakura is swift and strong both physically and deck wise. Your job is to be swifter and stronger."

The walls stopped groaning as the Bakura paused. It seemed to look around for a minute, before seeing Anzu and running towards her. The girl screamed before sprinting back into the maze. Losing its prey, the creature drew a dagger from its belt and threw to towards the first moving object it saw. Ryou yelped as the knife just missed his head.

"I'm really beginning to question your teaching methods!" Pegasus ignored the comment, taking another sip from his glass.

"Look for its blind spot! Every spirit has one." I ran through a four way intersection in the maze, when the twins turned and ran back the way I came...almost colliding with the spirit. "Find it, hide in it and strike!" Tristan stepped back as the Bakura stepped forward. Duke was frozen so Tristan had to lean back against him. Tristan went to side step the spirit but the Bakura blocked his way, smirking. It copied his every move, like a twisted mirror. Duke breathed in deeply... but soon regretted it.

"Ugh... Do you ever bathe?" Duke couldn't breathe, pushing Tristan forward hoping it would clear the air.

"If you don't like it, then just get your own blind spot." Tristan elbowed his twin, and Duke pushed him back forward.

"How about I give you one?" Tristan got ready to punch Duke grabbing his collar, when the Bakura cleared its throat. The twins froze, remembering they weren't exactly out of danger. A Dark Necrofear appeared and fired a shadowy ball of energy at the pair yet Duke managed to drag not only himself, but his brother out of the way. Pegasus sighed.

"Blind spot, yes. Deaf stop, not so much." The others ran ahead, but I stopped just in front of Pegasus.

"Hey, so how would one sneak up on a Pharaoh?" Pegasus sipped his spritzer, before glaring at me.

"No one's ever met one and lived to tell the tale. Now GET IN THERE!" I stepped back a few paces.

"I know, I know, but hypothetically..."

"Yugi!" I looked to my left. Joey and Kaiba were kneeling down near the corner, the latter glaring at me. Kaiba looked around the corner, quickly ducking back after almost making eye contact with the spirit. It was looking around, yet didn't see Kaiba and Joey both army roll to behind the next corner. I went to move in a similar fashion, but the weight of the duel disk stopped me mid-roll, and successfully catching the Bakura's attention.

It snarled at me, and I ran off screaming. The creature jumped back up onto the walls, leaping two walls and landing near Kaiba and Joey. Just as Kaiba was about to summon a monster, Joey pushed him aside.

"Watch out, Kaiba. I'll take care of this." Joey carelessly summoned a Swordsman of Landstar, and barked an attack at the fairy warrior. It lunged at the spirit... and missed...by a lot. The Bakura laughed at the monster before waving its hand and the Dark Necrofear did the work. Joey life points fell to 2300 and Kaiba just glared at him.

"The sun was in my eyes, Kaiba." Seto ran off was the Dark Necrofear lunged and the Bakura drew a knife. Joey ran after him, barely noticing they were being chased by the spirit. "What do ya want me to do, block out the sun? I could do dat, but I don't have da time!" Joey took a left while Kaiba ran straight, spirit still following him. "Spirits probably take da daytime off, right? Like a cat."

The Bakura chased Kaiba, enjoying the hunt and using powerful attacks at random, resulting in the massive wooden walls to fall over like dominos. I was still trying to get information out of Pegasus, barely noticing the commotion.

"Has anyone ever seen one napping?" The others ran past, some bumping into me.

"Yugi!" The Bakura was in sharp pursuit of Kaiba, knocking over most walls in the process. Kaiba managed to get a boost by jumping off a wall that was about to fall. One problem though...

"MUTO!" ...I was in his landing area. The older boy completely flattened me, both of our decks flying everywhere. The others looked, shouting inappropriate comments.

"Ohh! Love on the battle field." Joey only grunted.

"Seto could do better." Kaiba quickly jumped off me and looked through the scattered cards, searching for something that could possibly defeat the unharmed Bakura. I quickly got up, trying to think of some form of strategy.

"Let me...Why don't you..?" Kaiba looked up and saw the spirit charging towards us, looking through cards faster barely having time to register the attack power. The Bakura was almost on us and running out of ideas he grabbed my duel disk, almost ripping my arm off in the process, and slamming it into the spirits face. The creature just about fell over but regained it's footing before running off. Pegasus looked over at us and saw the arena in ruins.

"Nice thinking, Kaiba." He went back to his comic book, and Kaiba stood there, panting. The brunette turned to face me, and he did not look pleased. He threw the now broken duel disk at my feet.

"Is this some kind of a joke to you? Our parents' war is about to become ours. Figure out which side you're on." Kaiba walked off with the others, leaving me there to pick up the fallen cards. I stood up and dusted myself off just as Pegasus was about to leave.

"Turn off the lights behind you, Yugi-boy." He shut the door and I glared at where Pegasus had just stood. I really, truly do hate him.

* * *

**CODH: Hold me back**

**Yami Bakura + Ryou: *grab jumper***

**CODH: LET ME AT HIM, LET ME AT HIM**

**Kaiba: *smirk***

**CODH: YOU PRICK!**

**Ryou: Please review *jumper rips* Oh no...**

**CODH: *strangling Kaiba* Ohh, and I went through and fixed those typos. Thanks for telling me, I was stressed and forgot to re-read the chap**


	8. Booster Packs

The sun was shining through the willow trees, reflecting off the sparkling fresh water lake. I walked down the path, almost invisible behind a new duel disk. Coming towards the bottom, I stopped and carefully looked over the disk. Not seeing any signs of movement, I threw a small booster pack into the clearing. Nothing moved and after a few minutes, I went to walk into the clearing. At least...I tried. The duel disk got caught between the two massive boulders that make up the pathway. After trying to pull it out, I gave up and abandon the oversized disk, ducking under it and walking into the clearing armed only with my deck. _At least the pharaoh can't get out using this path now._

I picked up the booster pack and looked around, proceeding with caution. Even though there was a chance the spirit had left, one could never be too safe. I turned around and walked into the more open space, not seeing a bruised pharaoh hiding on one of the taller rocks just out of my line of vision. It watched me in silence, studying me, as if trying to decide whether I was a threat or not. I turned back around as it stood up. I jumped and it watched me more, before hesitantly climbing down. We simply stared at each other and I held out the booster pack. The pharaoh studied me before taking a small step forward... followed by another.

It was almost within an arm's length before it jumped back, glaring at me and emitting a low growl from its throat. I jumped and pulled my arm pack, automatically reaching for my deck. The growling increased at the sight of my cards and everything clicked. The pharaoh, most powerful of duel spirits, was _afraid_ I was going to _attack_.

I went to pick up the cards, my fingers brushing over the case when the pharaoh summoned a monster. I took a few steps back terrified as the brown fur ball looked at me, before vanishing in a puff of smoke. Before the spirit could tell the monster to attack, I quickly grabbed my deck and dropped it. The pharaoh glared at me before motioning with its head. I picked up the deck with my foot, balancing it for a second before kicking it off... a little too far. A splash rang out as my deck hit the water, and I cringed as they slowly sank to the bottom of the lake. I looked up and my eyes met with the pharaohs again. It looked at me for a second, when all its features softened. It just looked at me, confused. I took a deep breath, holding out the booster pack again. And like last time, the pharaoh slowly walked forward.

It reached its arm out hesitantly, ready to jump if I tried anything. But I couldn't...after all my deck was at the bottom of the lake. It glared at me but I didn't really notice, looking for the brown monster the pharaoh had summoned, but if I hadn't seen it I never would have guessed it was even summoned.

"I could've sworn you summoned a-"

Something furry brushed by my hand and I yelped. I looked back towards the pharaoh and saw the brown fur ball, holding my booster pack! I jumped, naturally.

"Monster!"

"Kuriee!" The creature dropped the cards into the pharaoh's hands, before returning to the deck. I watched as the pharaoh opened the pack, seeming to forget I even existed. A smirk slowly grew on the spirit's face and I could only guess there were some good cards in the pack. It turned back to me and walked closer, scanning for any more cards. I tried to run off but tripped over my own shoe, crawling until my back came up against a rock and I was cornered.

"No, no no no."

The pharaoh kept coming closer, and I was terrified. I tried getting further away from the creature... but the boulder wasn't in a cooperative mood.

"I don't have any more." The spirit watched me, and right as I thought I was gonna die...the creature backed away. I didn't dare move as the Pharaoh shuffled through its deck. It was amazing; I'd never seen anything like it. In a matter of seconds the pharaoh had shuffled the new cards into its deck, chose 5 it didn't need and slipped them into the opened booster pack wrapping.

It walked over to me and dropped them on my lap, before walking off and standing nearby with an almost human look. I picked up the booster pack like it was a delicate snow flake, and looked towards the pharaoh. First it tries to kill me, now it's giving me free cards. Talk about temperamental!

It looked at me, then to the cards in my hand, and back to me. I followed its eyes and saw what it was trying to say. I sighed not really wanting to, but I slid my hand under the pre-opened wrapping and closed my eyes. I heard the foil crinkle under my fingertips, but then silence. I opened one eye, then the other. No monsters, nothing killing me...I looked over at the spirit who rolled its eyes. I finally decided to look at the cards. And I was shocked.

The head of Exodia looked up at me from the pack. I grinned and scooped up the five cards, flicking through them. _Exodia the Forbidden One, Celtic Guardian, Feral Imp, Silver Fang..._

I came to the final card. A beautiful looking blonde girl, wearing a sky blue magician's outfit with pink skirt. A matching wand was in her right hand, her eyes a sparkling green._ Dark Magician Girl_

I looked towards the pharaoh, and couldn't believe it. The pharaoh motioned to its pocket, so I mirrored the action, placing the cards near my pants pocket. The spirit showed no signs of objection, so I placed the cards in the pocket and grinned. The spirit seemed to study the expression, and slowly its lip curved up and it smiled back. Well...it was more of a smirk/smile but still, made me feel pretty special. I slowly stood up and hesitantly walked towards the pharaoh. I was almost within touching distance of the spirit when its smile fell and a glow filled the clearing, forcing to cover my eyes. I looked up in time to see a Koumori Dragon fly over the lake. The creature seemed to be flying on a funny angle, and I cringed as it came to a crash landing on the other side of the lake. The light flashed over the area again, but it was dim enough for me to watch. The pharaoh took human form again but wobbled, and for a second I thought he was gonna pass out.

_Wait, since when did I refer to him as him?...Damn I did it again!_

Anyway, he...I mean it...I mean...Augh! He stopped himself from completely falling over, but still fell to a kneeling position. I could hear him breathing from where I was standing, at least 250 metres away.

* * *

I was panting, trying to stop myself from passing out in exhaustion. I know I shouldn't have changed form, but that boy got too close. I can't believe I almost let that boy get too close. It was so stupid! My chest ached from the strain of changing without the puzzle. I curled up into a protective ball, sighing_. Just... a minute's... rest. _

I almost closed my eyes, when a bird hopping around on a branch caught my eye. It flew off, and I turned to go back to sleep when directly in my line of vision was the boy, sitting a few metres off with that stupid grin. He waved at me, and I turned around to face the cliff walls_. _Even though I wasn't watching, I could hear the boy move closer. Now this kid was a lot of things, annoying, stupid, slightly on the cute side...but he wasn't going to be a thief any time soon. A bank wouldn't need alarms; the neighbours would hear his footsteps. I waited until he was almost hovering over my arm when I looked over my shoulder. He quickly turned and walked off, but I still stood up and walked off in the other direction._ Is a little sleep too much to a_

I managed to find a small gap between one of the trees and a rock, and against all my better instincts I climbed into the hole and almost fell asleep straight away. _Soon as I get...my power back...I'm...gonna blow up...all these...Ra forsaken...rocks!_

I don't know how long I slept, but when I woke up the sun was beginning to set. Looking around, I was genuinely surprised to see the boy with tri-coloured hair sitting across the lake. He had a stick in his hand, drawing scribbles into the dirt. I crawled out of my hole and walked over to the boy. I heard him inhale sharply, so I knew he was aware of my presence. He continued his drawings never the less, tracing my shadow and drawing on a face. I smirked and looked down at the boy. He looked far too weak to be a duelist, I doubt he even knew the difference between spell and trap cards. Well, since he'd been soooo nice losing my puzzle and getting me stuck here, I decided to give him his own private lesson, Pharaoh style.

I walked over to a near dead tree and pulled off a branch, but since I'm stronger than a human I ended up with half the tree_. _No matter...i dragged the branch around, making a series of patterns in the dirt. The boy stopped and watched me, a confused look on his face. I smirked, and once satisfied stood outside the maze in the dirt. I summoned Kuriboh and watched as the boy looked around; trying to figure out if there was any sort of trap. When he decided there wasn't he tried to walk out, but he stepped on the line and Kuriboh growled before charging at him. He jumped back and Kuriboh stopped.

_Only when he's on the line._

He saw the fur ball stop, and after a second he tried stepping on the line again as if testing a hypothesis. Kuriboh moved forward but stopped as soon as the boy moved his foot again. He tested the idea once more before stepping over the line. Kuriboh didn't move and the boy looked at me. I gave him a small nod and he smiled back. He turned around again and again, like playing a giant game of twister. He increased his speed and I watched amused, most people would've been attacked by now. After a minute or two he finally got out of the maze, but he was so caught up in not getting attacked he didn't realise I was right behind him. I yawned and the boy jumped, turning around to face me.

He looked at me before slowly expending his hand. Kuriboh started to growl and the boy shut his eyes scared. I sent Kuriboh back to the deck. The boy still had his eyes closed. If I attacked him he'd have no way of defending himself.

_This boy has too much faith._

Hesitantly, I placed my hand in the boy's and we both froze. We stood like that for a second, before I slowly started to shake the boys' hand. He opened his eyes and looked at me, his grin slowly growing. I rolled my eyes, showing him it wasn't such a big deal. The first time a human and a spirit ever locked eyes and didn't kill each other, plus made contact not for the purpose of killing each other. History being re-written with a simple hand shake. No big deal what so ever. The boy looked at his feet and started to go red.

"Hi...My name's Yugi." Yugi...I burned the name into the back of my mind.

"Hello Yugi, My name's Yami." I mentally slapped myself. _You weren't supposed to say that!_ But the damage had been done. I dropped Yugi's hand and walked off. Yugi just grinned, before walking up his little trail and heading back to the main city.

* * *

** CODH: This chap was the hardest to write yet; I've been working on it for 8 hours straight**

**Yami Bakura: And it still sucks**

**CODH: I know right? Alright goodnight *passes out***

**Yami Bakura: WTF?**

**Ryou: It's 4.30 am, cut her some slack**

**CODH: *in sleep* Begging...for...reviews**

**Yami Bakura: It's official, fan fics rule her life**

**Ryou: Please review...please**


	9. Pegasus night class and DMG is EVIL

Pegasus and the gang sat around a fire place, roasting dinner. All eyes were on Pegasus, who was telling a story I'd heard millions of times working around the fort, and every time the details changed just a little.

"And with one hit, it popped out my eye and swallowed it whole. I saw the look on his face, I was delicious. But before he could pass the word around, I managed to summon my Toon Blue Eyes and kill the beast, claiming this as my prize." Pegasus motioned to his stone eye and blinked the other, the fire casing a creepy glow over his face. Ryou swallowed half a lettuce leaf and grinned.

"Isn't it weird to think your eye was inside a duel spirit? Like, if you could still see what it was seeing, and after being discarded as body waste you could have lead everyone to the spirit's lair." The others stared at Ryou with a look of disgust. Joey growled, glaring at a roast chicken as if it was its fault millennium spirits existed.

"I swear I'm so angry right now! I will avenge your beautiful eye! I'll cut out the eye of every spirit I fight, with my Flame Swordsman!" Pegasus took a bite of chicken, shaking his head.

"No, you see every millennium spirit has an object called a Millennium Item. They are what allow the beasts to summon monsters. Now thankfully these items are extremely fragile, and if you hit them with an attack in just the right spot they'll fall apart like last week's tuna casserole. No item, no way of attack. The spirits would be like sitting ducks. Now, who knows what item a Marik has?"

"Rod!"

"That turns into a dagger." Duke glared at his sibling.

"No it doesn't."

"It does too!"

"That's just a wives tale!" The pair started to fight again, but Pegasus interrupted.

"Marik do indeed have a Millennium Rod, and it _is_ true they can be used as daggers. Now, a Dartz?" Anzu butt in, shocking everyone with the fact she actually knew something.

"Dartz use a green gem called an Orichalcos. Each gem has a six pointed star on it. Even though they are beautiful stones, they radiate an evil so strong anyone who touches them will find themselves brainwashed by the Dartz that owns the stone. Some believe if you could actually take the stone from a Dartz, they would become good...but it's just a theory." Everyone was speechless...that's the longest Anzu had ever gone without saying friendship! Pegasus clapped his hands, showering the girl with applause.

"Very good Anzu! Truly fascinating. Now, anyone know a Kisara's?"

"The Blue Eyes White Dragon." Everyone looked over at Kaiba who had an emotionless look on his face...but that's not surprising for Kaiba. "The card itself is the key to a Kisara's power, that's why they're so much harder than most spirits to defeat. If they summon Blue Eyes and you somehow defeat it, the spirit is almost dead anyway." Pegasus nodded, summarising what Kaiba had just said.

"So basically there's no way to weaken a Kisara without duelling and defeating it, since even though Millennium spirits are stupid they wouldn't just hand over the source of their power. And finally, anyone know what a Bakura's item is?"

"A ring." Ryou was sitting away from the group, almost seeming to hide from the light of the fire. "A Bakura uses the souls of its victims to form a ring and feed on the negative emotions around them. It's debateable whether or not they are the most humane of the millennium spirits, since they never actually kill anyone. The soul-less victims fall into a coma like state, so a Bakura never actually kill anyone."

"But there's no hope of the victims will ever waking up. Well it seems we all know the basics of millennium spirits, one less class I need to teach. Well, everyone off to bed. Tomorrow we get to the big boys-."

"Wait, what is a Pharaoh's millennium item?" Everyone looked at me and Pegasus sighed.

"If someone knew, then we would have tried to finish it off a long time ago. Now as I was saying...

"How would you know if a spirit didn't have an item, like if someone else took it?" The others groaned, but Pegasus just looked at me.

"Well...some people have said that spirits without an item seem slow and sluggish, which is why they are so much easier to defeat."

"So tired?" Pegasus glared at me with his one eye, which is a very creepy experience by the way.

"Yes, so I guess tired would be a word you could use to describe it. Alright, so tomorrow we get to the big boys, slowly but surely making our way up to the Kisara, but who will have the honour of killing it?" Tristan leaned back, grinning.

"It's gonna be me. It's my destiny, see?" Someone gasped.

"Your mom let you get a tattoo?"

"It's not a tattoo, it's a birthmark." Duke rolled his eyes.

"I've been stuck with you since birth and I've never seen that before." I ran off while they were talking, but Kaiba saw me. He almost looked like he was going to follow me, but Joey called him back to the others. I continued running into the darkness, knowing this was going to be a long night.

* * *

I got to the fort and locked the door behind me, flicking the light switch. I walked over to the table, where the puzzle pieces lay spread across various drawings of the phara-...Yami. I had no idea what shape this puzzle was meant to look like or if it even was Yami's item, but I had to try. Picking up one of the pieces, I studied the surface and tried to figure out how I would approach this.

_Well, it has edges so I can cross out sphere. So...whatever this shape is it's a kind of pyramid or prism. If I can find all the corners and measure the angles I should be able to figure out at least what size and shape I might be aiming to make._

I sighed. _Ra, I hate maths._

__.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.__

After measuring all the angles multiple times, I had come to one definite conclusion.

a) I am never doing maths again

Wait...duelling is maths, no fair! I looked over my page of scribbled numbers and sighed. The corner was 90 degrees on one side, and 60 degrees on the other two sides. All four corners were the same. There was one piece with four 60 degree sides, my guess it was a tip or point...wait, something's coming to me. I moved away the other pieces so I was left with 2 of the corners and the tip and soon as I saw the three pieces together I almost slapped myself.

A pyramid, with equilateral triangles for the sides and a square base.

"YES! I GOT IT!" I celebrated for a minute, drawing up a square based pyramid on a fresh piece of paper. "I've got this." With new found hope, I started my mission to complete the puzzle.

One hour later, and I had managed to get two pieces of the puzzle together. I looked over at the clock...2 am.

"I'm not gonna make this." I leaned over the desk and closed my eyes, letting myself fall asleep.

__.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.__

I woke up to an annoying clicking sound. _Click, click, click._

Moaning, I looked up before stopping dumbstruck.

There was a blonde girl flying above the desk, wearing a sky blue outfit I'd recognise anywhere.

"Dark Magician Girl!" I screamed and half jumped, half fell off the chair. The magician looked up at me, before looking back at the desk. She completely ignored me, and I noticed for the first time I could see a slightly blurred version of the workshop through her. _Great, now there's a transparent Dark Magician Girl flying around the fort. I'm delirious._

I stood up, not taking my eyes off the duel monster. She started to hum, and I saw what she was doing. The magician moved another piece of the puzzle forward and it joined the half-finished frame.

_Now there's a transparent Dark magician Girl helping to fix the pharaoh's puzzle. _The magician looked at me and I grinned nervously. She motioned for me to come closer and I did as told. When a duel monster tells you what to do, you do it okay? Soon as I was close enough, she pushed me into a chair and shoved a puzzle piece in my hand. I looked at her and she pointed to the half complete puzzle, her message obvious.

_Finish it._

I picked up the frame with one hand, put I really couldn't see where the piece would go. I tried pushing it into a few different places but it wouldn't fit. Close to sleep again I started to fall forward but a sharp pain in my back woke me right up.

"Ouch!" I looked at Dark Magician Girl, who was tossing one end of her staff up and down like a baseball bat. "What was that for?" The magician pointed at the puzzle again. "Look, I can't do it. It's impossible. See?" I pushed the puzzle piece into a random place. A small glow came from the puzzle and the piece stayed. Dark Magician Girl started to laugh silently behind me as I hit my head against the table. "I don't believe it."

This process repeated for the next two hours and believe me...they were long _and_ painful. Whenever I was near sleep, Dark Magician Girl would hit me with that staff. One by one the pieces vanished until I had a single shape, the pyramid. Unlike I had originally thought the puzzle was designed to hang with the base up, coming down to a tip. I stood up, holding the puzzle so the magician could see. I would be proud of my work, only one problem.

"There's a piece missing." I looked at the transparent magician, who was clapping silently with an almost sarcastic grin. "There's one piece missing. Did you know that?" Dark Magician Girl floated over and poked the puzzle, looking at me. _There's a piece missing._

"I noticed. Would you know where that piece is?" The magician shrugged. _Nope._ I sighed, sitting pack down completely and utterly disappointed. "One piece short..." My eyes started to close themselves, but I looked back at the Magician.

"Can I sleep no-" I stopped mid-sentence. Dark Magician Girl was gone. I quickly looked around, but she was nowhere to be seen. "Finally." I yawned... asleep before I could even hit the table.

* * *

** 51 REVEIWS! THAT'S 1/2 A HUNDRED. WOW *sparkly eyes* **

**CODH: Wah, I wanna write fluff now!**

**Yami Bakura: Did you hear what you just said?**

**Ryou: It was Easter, too much chocolate**

**CODH: CHOCOLATE!**

**Yami Bakura: Oh**

**CODH: Thanks to the peeps who have stuck with me throughout this fanfic, we got 51 reviews!**

**Yami Bakura: -_- Yay**

**CODH: And we're not even halfway**

**Yami Bakura: Great**

**Ryou: *elbows* Be happy for the author**

**Yami Bakura: Not in a million years**

**CODH: So I'll ask in a million and one years**

**Yami Bakura: You are weird, okay?**

**CODH: I know**

**Ryou: You know deep down she want's reviews, so please *puppy eyes***


	10. The faulty Puzzle

My hard work wasn't worth it. About three hours after I collapsed, Pegasus came in and kicked me out. It was the one day of the week we didn't have training and since I couldn't go back to sleep, I decided to go to Harpies' Point.

"Hey, Yami...Are you still here?"

"Where else would I be genius?" I looked up and there he was. The great Pharaoh himself, perched up on a humongous rock.

"Why are you always up there?" Yami leaned back, his head falling over the side of the boulder to face me.

"If I'm always up here when why do you need to ask where I am, midget?" I sighed, even though Yami had a point.

"Is Yugi too hard to say?"

"Yep, so now I'll call you pineapple head." I rolled my eyes.

"And that's so much easier to say."

"It is. Yu-gi...pine-apple-head. Pineapple head sounds better anyway." Yami sat back up and continued with whatever he was doing, most likely going through his deck.

"Please come down?"

"Hmm...No." Lack of sleep and frustration was starting to get to me, so I was not in the mood for Yami's little mind games.

"Please?"

"But if I climb down...I'll have to climb all the way back up later." That was the final straw. If Yami wanted to play a dumb game, I'd play along. Walking a few feet away, I felt a smirk growing on my face.

"Fine, I guess I'll just have to keep this then." I pulled the puzzle from my bag, and suddenly I had Yami's undivided attention.

"Give that to me."

"This is your item isn't it?"

"Yugi."

"Come down and get it."

Next thing I knew Yami had me in head lock, cutting off my air supply. "Yami!"

"Give me the puzzle Yugi." I handed him the puzzle struggling to breathe. He let go of my neck and walked off, leaving me on the ground fighting for breath.

"What that really necessary?"

"Yes. Do you know what this means?" Yami reached into his pocket and pulled out a small amount of gold, the last piece of the puzzle. "It means I can finally get out of this place." He pushed the piece into place and a blinding light emitted from the puzzle. I was forced to shield my eyes, but when the glow died down there was no sign of Yami. What was there though, was a lot more terrifying.

I almost screamed, jumping back. At first it appeared to be a Curse of Dragon, but it looked way too big. I stepped away as quietly as possible, when laughter erupted from above me. I looked up and saw a knight in glorious red and blue armour. So I came to the conclusion it was Gaia the Dragon Champion... but then the spikey, tri-colored hair sticking out from the helmet quickly made me change my mind.

"Yami?"

"Thanks for fixing my puzzle Yugi. In exchange, I won't burn your house down…yet." The dragon screeched, flapping its wings and elevating itself off the ground, successfully blowing dust and dead leaves everywhere. I looked away to protect my eyes but turned back to see Yami and the dragon, already 300 feet off the ground and rising. As I watched them soar off, a terrible thought crossed my mind.

_I just helped the single most feared Millennium Spirit known to man._

* * *

Yami POV

The dragons powerful wing beats under me let a relaxing vibe throughout my body. I told myself I didn't feel bad about what I said to Yugi, but my gut said otherwise. Mentally commanding the dragon to go faster, I hoped any form of guilt would be lost with the wind.

Suddenly, the puzzle pulled against my stomach, like a magnetic force was dragging it away from the direction the dragon was flying in.

"What?"

And then…the dragon vanished from underneath me. No warning, no puff of smoke. It just vanished, leaving me to fall through the air. A fine dust-like substance surrounded me, and as I fell I realised it was the Gaia Knight Armour, being drawn back to the shadow realm.

Yugi might have shouted my name, but when again it could have been wishful thinking. I landed right in the centre of the lake, a fall that surely would've severely injured or even _killed_ a human… and while I was sure I didn't break anything, I hurt all over. Think of the worst belly flop you've ever done, times it by 50 and move all the pain to your back.

I floated in the water for a second, hoping my limbs would stop aching. When no such relief came, I slowly started to swim over to the bank. Dragging myself onto shore, I rolled onto my back, trying to get as much air back into my lungs as possible. _What just happened?_

"Yami!" Yugi was running over to me, looking concerned. I used my elbows to push myself into a sitting position.

"Don't touch me." Yugi stopped where he was and looked at me for a second, before sitting down 3 feet away.

"What happened?"

"If I knew I wouldn't be sitting here right now." Looking into the sky, I thought about what just happened, and how did it happen. Hitting a mental wall, I sighed. _I was so close, too._

"I'm sorry." Out of the corer of my eye, I stole a glance at the boy, whose hair had fallen over his eyes. I sighed, sometimes humans really made no sense.

"Yugi, why would you be sorry?" He looked away from me, actions speaking louder than words. _Why do humans always blame themselves over stuff they had no control of?  
_"Yugi, whatever happened just then wasn't your fault." Yugi looked over and at me and smiled, even though he didn't think I was watching.

"Thanks Yami." I smiled slightly, but you couldn't tell.

"Well, I guess I'm stuck here until someone kills me."

"That's not true." I looked over at the boy, who had a steely look of determination written on his usually soft face. "I'll protect you."

I stared at Yugi, before looking over the lake. _I'll protect you._

At first it started as a small chuckle…but it slowly grew until I was rolling around on the ground, laughing that hard my sides ached… not that falling out of the sky helped. Yugi just glared at me, not seeing the joke.

"What?" My eyes started to water, but I still had enough respect for myself as not to start crying.

"It's just…that's _so_ reassuring. Yugi, my knight in shining leather. Seriously, what's the strongest monster you can summon? Marshmallon?" Yugi turned red and quickly stood up. I guess I'd hit a sore spot because he looked ready to explode.

"How dare you? I could summon anything I wanted to, no matter the level! I can defend my friends or myself if I needed to." I grinned, an idea crossing my mind.

"So let's duel." Yugi went pale and stepped back.

"What?" I pushed myself of the ground, as if the thought of duelling someone gave me the necessary strength.

"Let's duel, nothing serious or anything. When you pass out I promise I'll stop attacking." Yugi frowned, giving the line thought.

"_When_?"

"Yes when. I doubt you could even scratch me." He seemed to think of all the possibilities of the situation, before a big childish grin spread across his face.

"Alright, let's duel." Yugi grabbed his duel disk and I almost laughed. He needed the big hunk of metal just to summon monsters, while I only needed my puzzle. He drew five cards, and I was surprised he had already gotten a new deck. Even more surprising, I hadn't noticed until just now. Drawing five cards from my own deck, I looked over at Yugi.

"It's time to duel. I'll go first." I quickly looked over the cards in my hand, and chose the weakest one. "I summon Kuriboh in defence mode." The brown fur ball appeared with a chirp. Yugi nodded, looking over his own cards.

"Okay, I summon Celtic Guardian and-"

Before Yugi could command an attack, the puzzle reacted and I was forced to cover my eyes as Yugi shield his own. Something heavy entered my right hand, and all my clothing felt heavier, like armour. The light finally faded and I looked down. I was about to scream…but Yugi did that for me.

"AAHHHHH! What.? I….I didn't do it, I SWEAR!" I hadn't been forced into Celtic guardian form for ages…wait, scratch that. I'd never been forced into any form before, and I hadn't been in the situation to summon Celtic guardian in years. Dropping the blade, I faced Yugi, trying to remain calm.

"Yugi, take the card off your duel disk…_slowly_."

* * *

**CODH: I'M SORRY**

**Ryou: -_- On behalf of the reviewers I quote 'I hate you'**

**CODH: I'M SORRY! It's been so long!**

**Yami Bakura: Only a month**

**Ryou: ONLY?**


	11. Yami's a Great Teacher

I looked over at Yami, who looked just as shocked as I felt. His eyes locked with mine, and I could've sworn there was a glint of fear in them, but that's silly. We're talking about Yami here, the pharaoh. He doesn't feel fear.

"Yugi, take the card off your duel disk…slowly." My mind went blank. How to you take a card of a duel disk again? Don't you need to send it to the graveyard or something? Have it destroyed by battle?

"Whenever you're ready Yugi." Deciding to do exactly as told for a change, I simply took the card off the field and back to my hand. A sharp light came from the puzzle again and I turned away. How Yami could stand it I had no idea. When I turned back though, Yami was back in his original cloths. Black tang top and pants. No helmet, no armour. The formally dropped sword no longer lay on the ground.

"I'm sorry." Yami looked up at me.

"Do you have any idea in the slightest of why that happened?" I shook my head and Yami sighed, sitting back down. The duel was long gone from our minds and I walked closer, sitting down a few feet from Yami again. "Absolutely no idea?"

"None what so ever." Yami fell silent and I thought over everything I had done completing the puzzle...well actually Yami was the one who put in the final piece. We both groaned, probably thinking the same thing.

_Why me?_

I lay down on the grass. Last night played over in my head. The puzzle, the maths *shudder*, then the blonde witch...literally. My head still hurt from the bump Dark Magician Girl had given me. Wait...

"Do you think it was the Dark Magician Girl?" Yami looked over at me and I shot back into sitting position, trying to ignore the protest my bruised back gave.

"Dark Magician Girl?"

"Last night when I was trying to fix the puzzle Dark Magician Girl appeared, and hit me with that rod a few hundred times." I rubbed the back of my head and winced. She really did overdo it. Yami rolled his eyes, muttering something under his breath that sounded vaguely like 'So that's where that bump came from'.

"What was that?"

"I said I doubt she did anything, after all she serves me." I sighed and lay back down on the grass.

"So we've hit a dead end." Yami shrugged.

"Basically."

* * *

So now...to summarise the crappiness of my life.

Let shot out of sky, check

Get trapped in valley with cliff faces too steep to climb, check

Loose puzzle, check

Meet the world's worst duelist who is currently the only one that knows my location, check

Fix puzzle and permanently damage it leaving my only escape useless, check

My life pretty much sucked right now. And now, whenever Yugi summoned a monster...I was forced into that form.

I was his puppet now, even though he would never see it like that. All freedom had just been stripped away from me. But then again, maybe this was than going back to the lair; to the souls I had the misfortune of calling family. Either way, I was stuck and only Yugi knew. I couldn't contact anyone not that I'd want to, and if Yugi told anyone...

"No one is to know I'm here." Yugi looked up at me.

"I'm not completely stupid. I know what they would do." An awkward silence followed...but suddenly Yugi perked up, an idea written on his face almost. "How about we make a deal?" I raised my eyebrows.

"A deal?" Yugi nodded excitedly.

"We help each other out. I'll let you change into anything you want if you can help me." I smirked; Yugi wasn't as dumb as he looked.

"What do I have that you could possibly want?" I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. Yugi looked away from me, seemingly ashamed of what he was about to ask.

"I need to pass Duelist training-"

"And you want me to tell you how to defeat the other spirits?" Yugi looked terribly guilty...but I couldn't help but laugh.

"You...want me...to..." I tried to stop laughing, but it was the stupidest thing I'd ever heard, which is why I have no idea why I said this. "Sure." Yugi's eyes widened so much I thought they would pop out of his skull.

"Really?" I shrugged.

"Why not? I tell you what you need to pass, and you help me with the puzzle." Yugi's face lit up.

"It's a deal." We shook on it, and the first truce was made between Millennium spirit and human. "So what will you be 'duelling' tomorrow?" Yugi still looked guilty, yet somehow relieved I'd agreed to help him. _I swear I can read you like a book_.

"Um...I think Pegasus said something about a Dartz." Dartz? I admit I was surprised by the fact. Honestly, Dartz may have been an old fool, but his life points were higher than the common duelist. If the others were at Yugi's level...

"How many students have died?" Yugi looked over at me as if I were the insane one.

"What?"

"Dartz isn't exactly weak."

"Pegasus told us that." I frowned. Yugi didn't seem to understand the danger he was in...not that I cared or anything.

"Dartz life points are roughly double yours." Yugi seemed fine with the new information, sitting there as if nothing happened.

"WHAT?" He started ranting, something along the lines of 'Stupid Pegasus...gonna die...colours at funeral'. I rolled my eyes.

"He's not that hard to defeat." Yugi's eyes narrowed.

"FOR YOU!" I smirked. Yeah, he was _really_ easy for me to beat.

"True, but his whole attack and defence is based on one card. Orichalcos Shunoros...it's level 10." Yugi paled, looking ready to pass out. I sighed. "I know it sounds strong."

"No...really?" I glared at the boy, shaking my head at his failed sarcasm.

"It sounds strong, but its attack is however monsters are summoned against it times 1000. Summon one monster, 1000 ATK. Summon two-"

"2000 ATK." I nodded, and Yugi didn't look quite as scared.

"Exactly. As long as you get the others not to panic and summon a bunch of monsters, it's weak. Summon one monster with over 2000 ATK points, wipe out his defence and chip away at his life points until there gone." The smaller boy's face lit up, like a giant weight was just taken off his shoulders. He stood back up and started to run off.

"Thanks Yami!" I jumped up, but he was already a good 200 metres off.

"Wait! What about the deal?"

"Tomorrow, I promise! See ya!" He ran up the small trail between the cliffs, and even though I was only an inch or so taller, it was still too small for me to get out through.

"YUGI!" But he was long gone. I groaned, before walking over to a tree. The sky was starting to darken and I realised just how much time had gone by. I sighed.

"If he doesn't come back tomorrow I swear I will kill him." But deep down in the back of my mind I knew Yugi wasn't the kind to break promises. So for now, all I can do is hope he doesn't get himself killed in that stupid training thing he did.

* * *

**CODH: I LOVE YOU ALL!**

**Ryou: You are so lucky you have forgiving reviewers**

**CODH: *tears up* I know**

**Yami Bakura: Don't start crying**

**CODH: :..D Since when did you care?**

**Yami Bakura: I don't**

**Ryou: Sure you don't**

**CODH: YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME!**

**Yami Bakura: I know**

**CODH: I meant the readers**


	12. I Surprise Everyone

"Today is about teamwork!" Pegasus unlocked the massive cage, and before we could even see it fully open the arena was filled with an eerie green gas. Remembering something we all learned in pre-school, we gathered into groups of two. Ryou went back to back with me, and considering how good he was a few days ago, I was more than glad to have the better duelist on my side.

"Now, a millennium spirit with low life points can't summon strong monsters. A Dartz is extra tricky. Having over 8000 life points, it can summon just about anything it wants at any one time. Your job is to defeat it before it kicks your butt." I don't know why, but when scared, Ryou has a slight habit of listing all the things that make the threat more dangerous.

"Strongest level monster ever seen summoned level 10. Using Orichalcos stones to create a green gas to blend in to, so quiet you won't know it's behind you until your laying near dead..." I turned, scared enough as it was.

"Will you please stop that?" Somewhere else in the thick gas Kaiba and Duke were back to back, armed with their duel disk and ready to summon a monster at any time. Joey and Tristan were set up in a similar fashion, only a few metres off from each but neither duo knew. Joey was in attack mode, ready to tackle anything that appeared.

"I swear, if any millennium spirit shows up I'm gonna..." Something moved nearby and Joey jumped. "THERE!" Quickly thinking, he summoned a Meotoko while Tristan summoned Cyber Commander. The purple monster charged at the target, while Cyber Commander stayed by the pair in Defence mode. Luckily, Kaiba and Duke both heard the slow moving Meotoko and managed to dodge. The fog thinned and Duke made out the shapes of the two biggest morons he knew.

"Hey! It's us, Idiots!" Tristan looked over at his twin, a little disappointed the attack had missed.

"Your butts are getting bigger. We thought you were the Dartz."

"Not that there's anything wrong with a Spirit like figure." Joey quickly tried to cover up the insult, but Kaiba marched over and punched Joey right on the side of his face. Duke stupidly threw his duel disk at Tristan and the younger brother fell over under the weight of the metal disk. He went to get up but screamed as he was dragged off by an unseen object. Duke walked towards where his brother once stood, but Kaiba raised his arm, stopping him.

"Wait." Suddenly, a large arm came out of no-where and knocked the duo over, as Tristan came running out of the green gas.

"Oh, I am hurt! I am very much HURT!" As the brunette ran past us, his Cyber Commander returned to the deck and Ryou gulped, looking into the unknown.

"Chances of survival are dwindling into single digits now." A gigantic leg emerged from the fog, and Ryou screamed while running backwards. Blue-ish green eyes glowed above us, and Ryou summoned his Dark Ruler Has Des and attacked the monstrous leg.

"Ryou wait!" But it was too late to call back the attack. The Dark Ruler launched at the gigantic monster above us, but even with 2450 ATK is was destroyed by what I could only guess was the Orichalcos Shunoros Yami had warned me about. Ryou's life points dropped to 3450 life points and he laughed nervously as the gigantic green stone monster completely stepped out of the fog. It was at least 30 feet tall, and looked strong enough to kill us all in one blow.

"Woops..." A gigantic arm came down to finish Ryou off and Pegasus jumped.

"Ryou!" I don't know how, but the tall albino managed to commando roll out of the way. The arm missed him and he managed to run out of the arena, and his Dark Ruler vanishing behind him. So...it was just me and the monster. Pegasus looked over to the others, and after seeing them safe turned back to me.

"Now Yugi!" I summoned the first monster I drew, and groaned, as the Blue Skinned elf appeared before me. Mystical Elf. "Oh, come on." A gust of wind came through the arena and all the gas and fog vanished, finally allowing me to see what I was completely up against. The stone monster was green, with basic limbs. Green energy, like lightning, held the arms onto the main structure. Purple lined the stone like armour, and it was hard to believe this monster currently only had 1000 ATK with only Mystical Elf summoned against it. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the spirit, Dartz.

Light blue hair trailed to near knee length, and closed white and blue robes. In its heterochromic eyes, one gold and the other green, its intentions were clear. Everyone watched me and my brain worked overtime. I sent Mystical Elf to the graveyard, leaving myself open to attack, but also leaving Orichalcos Shunoros with 0 attack points. I looked at my hand, and saw one monster that had just enough ATK to wipe it out. _Silver Fang_.

Even though it only had 1200 attack, it was still enough to wipe out Orichalcos Shunoros, with 1000 ATK once the wolf was summoned. I lay the card down in attack mode, and everyone behind he groaned.

"You're screwed."

"Dead."

"But that thing wiped out Headless Knight easy, and Headless Knight is stronger than Silver Fang." I held by breath, and I think everyone else did too, as the Slivery wolf pounced at the Orichalcos Shunoros. The whole monster seemed to shudder, before glowing a pristine white and shattering to a fine dust, before fading into nothing. Silver Fang seemed to growl in self-pride, taking down such a higher level monster. The Dartz tensed, and everyone watched in awe as the wolf herded the spirit back into the cage. I stepped forward, and the wolf jumped at the Dartz, forcing it to step backwards to avoid the attack.

"Back, back, back!" Another step forward, another step back. The Dartz glared at me, knowing if it went to summon a monster Silver Fang would have time to go for a direct attack. All it could do was avoid and dodge. Avoid and dodge. The others slowly walked forward as well, looks of shock on their faces. Kaiba actually looked disgusted; he'd not been able to do such a feat.

"Now, don't you make me tell you again! Yes, that's right. Back into your cage. Now..." The Dartz was finally backed into the corner of the cage, and with Silver Fang still acting watch dog I locked the door. "Think about what you've done." I turned back to see the others. They were all frozen is amazement, Ryou actually dropping his duel disk. I was slightly creeped out by their expressions...they were looking at me as if I was the monster.

"Okay...so are we done? 'Cause I've got some things I need to..." No-one moved, and it was hard to tell if they were even breathing. "Yep, I'll see you tomorrow!" I ran out if the arena, and could feel the daggers being glared into my back. But right now, I needed to go see Yami, for I was not one to break my promises.

* * *

**CODH: Guess what?**

**Yami Bakura: No**

**CODH: -_- You're no fun**

**Ryou: News?**

**CODH: Todays a day off, tomorrow's Saturday...the day after is Sunday and Monday's a public holiday**

**Ryou: O.O Four day weekend?**

**CODH: I KNOW! Chapters will be popping up like toast from a toaster**

**Yami Bakura: Unless you get writers block**

**CODH: *glare* Do not mention that evil**

**Yami Bakura: It'll happen eventually**

**Ryou: Well hurry up and type before that happens**

**CODH: Aye aye Cap-i-tan**


	13. Running on Water

"Yami!" I ran down the path and into the valley, looking for the pharaoh. "Yami!"

"Keep your voice down pineapple head." I grinned and turned around. Sure enough, there he was. Yami. Perched on that boulder I honestly think I will have to one day blow up. "Looks like you didn't die after all."

"Nope, didn't die." Yami sighed, almost sounding disappointed, before jumping down from the giant rock and landing next to me.

"Alright…did you bring your duel disk?" I nodded and motioned to the disk attached to my arm.

"Yes sir." Yami rolled his eyes, and I could just tell this was going to be the start of a 'beautiful' friendship.

"Okay, so if the same thing happens as last time I'll turn into anything you summon." I paled, yesterday playing over in my mind.

"Yeah, I summoned Celtic Guardian and then you…changed into it." I remembered it all perfectly. I'd never been so scared in my life.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" My eyes widen, and I looked at Yami as if he was crazy….note he probably was.

"What?"

"Summon a monster!"

"Why?" Yami groaned, probably thinking something along the lines of 'I'm stuck with the world's biggest moron'.

"You summon a monster, and then we find out if something did stuff up with your duel disk."

"Alright…" I grabbed my deck and flicked through the cards. "Anything in particular?" Yami took my deck and flicked through it, frowning. He gave it back to me and then reached for his deck, grabbed the first card and passing it to me.

"Use this one." I turned the card over. _Swift Gaia the Fierce Knight. _I'd never been trusted with such a rare card before, and Yami seemed to know that. "One scratch and I'll make being killed by a Kisara look like play time." I gulped, nodding my head.

"One question, what's wrong with my cards?" Yami looked at me in an almost sympathetic way.

""The only card you have over level 5 is dark magician girl." I felt my face go red, but I had no comeback, since it was…kinda true.

"Fine." Yami smirked before taking a few steps back. I took a deep breath, before laying the card in attack mode. Light take from the puzzle and I covered my eyes. When I turned back, Yami stood there in blue and red armour. A lance was in his left hand, and in his right were the reins of a magnificent horse.

The stallion was an unusual purple with yellow mane and tail, seeming to glow in self-pride. It was a gorgeous horse, and it knew it. I stared in awe, and Yami grinned ear to ear.

"Well, I guess that confirms it."

I nodded slowly, and Yami grinned before mounting the stallion, sitting in the saddle like he was born there.

"So you summon something and the puzzle reacts, forcing me into that form." The stallion started walking towards me, and I side stepped as it came to a halt beside me. "Getting on?" I looked up at Yami, who looked surprisingly taller on the creature.

"What?"

"Well if I accidentally walk right off a cliff you're gonna have to be there to summon something that can fly." My eyes widen.

"Walk off a cliff?" Yami shrugged.

"It could happen." I walked closer to the horse, looking at its back, since Yami occupied the saddle.

"You sure it's safe?" Yami looked at the horses back before shrugging.

"Should be safe enough." Yami offered his hand, and I swung onto the horse's back. The Stallion shifted under me and I grabbed onto Yami, who chuckled.

"You find that scary." Yami held onto the reins tighter, and suddenly his intentions were clear.

"Yami whatever you're thinking..." He kicked the stallion lightly, and suddenly we were charging towards the water. "**DON'T DO IT!**" I screamed at the top of my lung, squeezing my eyes shut, while Yami laughed insanely and the horse plunged into the water. But instead of being drenched like I expected, we just kept running. Slowly, I opened one eye, and then the next. We were running on the water, actually_ running_ on the water! I gasp, looking down at the lake and seeing our reflections on the mirror flat surface. To be honest, it was and still is the most exciting experience I've ever had.

I leaned closer to the water, but the shift of weight caused the stallion to miss a stride and almost trip. I felt myself slipping and screamed as I fell into the lake, dragging Yami down with me. We both hit the water, and I kicked myself back to the surface. Keeping my head above the water, I saw Yami come up next to me, helmet floating nearby. The horse turned around, and seeing it had lost both its riders, walked over to solid ground before grazing on grass near the lake edge.

I looked over at Yami and we both swam over to shore. Part of my fringe flopped down right between my eyes and I turned to face Yami, but he wasn't having much better luck. All his hair was drooping down, and we were both soaked through and through. Our eyes locked, and suddenly we were both laughing our heads off.

"Yugi, you've never ridden a horse before have you?"

"Not without a saddle!" We kept laughing until my eyes were watery and my stomach hurt that much it wasn't funny. I took the card of my duel disk and the stallion was sent back to the card, along with Yami's armour. I shook the card dry and handed it back to Yami, who just shook him head.

"We still have a long way to go." I nodded my head in agreement.

"Never been more right." Yami sighed, looking out over the lake.

"What are you practicing against tomorrow?"

"Um...I think we're duelling a Marik again, but that shouldn't be too hard."

"Ohh..." We both looked to the sky, and I noticed time had flown by again.

"I should be going if I want to be home before dark." Yami looked over at me and nodded in agreement.

"So you should. Well I guess I'll be seeing you here same time tomorrow."

"Yeah." I stood up and walked over to the path between the cliff walls of the valley. "See ya Yami." The spirit got up and grunted.

"See ya shorty."

* * *

**CODH: Two chapters in one day's work**

**Yami Bakura: Clap clap**

**Ryou: And that homework that's due next week?**

**CODH: I got plenty of time**

**Yami Bakura: That's what you said about the last one**

**Ryou: And the one before that**

**CODH: Hey! Is it that hard to believe I'm up to date with my homework?**

**Ryou + Yami Bakura: Yes**


	14. Case of the missing card

I ran into the arena, cursing. The others were finishing off the lesson, Pegasus forcing the spirit back into a cage. Joey turned around and saw me enter.

"Well, look who decided to wake up." Pegasus turn around, glaring at me.

"You're late Yugi-boy." I cringed under the harsh look.

"Sorry, I overslept!" Everyone groaned, and Pegasus just sighed.

"You're lucky Kaiba-boy managed to defeat the Marik by himself." My eyes widen, looking over at Kaiba.

"You actually killed it?" Kaiba snorted.

"I would've if Pegasus hadn't stopped me." Pegasus put his hands on his hips.

"Well if you'd killed it I would've had to go out and capture another one. Class dismissed." Everyone started to walk off, but Ryou stayed with me.

"So…did I miss anything in particular?" Ryou gave me the 'what am I going to do with you' look.

"Not really, just search and destroy."

"Ohh…" We walked out of the building, everyone else long gone. The village was like a ghost town, with everyone gone looking for the lair.

"What were you doing up so late?" I froze, not expecting the question, and not really having a good excuse.

"Um…It's an ….ongoing project thingy….I'm working on…yeah." Ryou didn't look at all convinced, but he just shrugged.

"Just…don't do anything to dangerous okay?" I nodded; helping the strongest millennium spirit known to man defiantly wasn't dangerous at all.

"I won't." Ryou smiled.

"Thanks." I looked at the sky, and could tell I was already late.

"Oh crap." I started running. "It was nice talking to you Ryou!"

"Yugi wait!" But I didn't stop running. _Yami's gonna have my head for this._

* * *

"You're late."

"I know and I'm sorry." Yami rolled his eyes.

"Here." The pharaoh passed me a card, Gaia the Dragon Champion.

"Do we always have to use Gaia?"

"_If_ you get better, then we'll use other cards. Until then, we should stick with cards where I can control the actual creature." I nodded; he did have a strong point.

"Okay." I summoned the card and the puzzle reacted. The dragon appeared, Yami sitting on top. He helped me up onto the dragons back, not saying a word.

"Now, there's no proper saddle for Dragon Champion…so hold on."

"Yami-" The dragon spread its wings, and with a single flap we were off the ground. "**Wait!**" We flew straight up, me holding onto Yami that tight I'm surprised he didn't suffocate.

"Alright, basically attack mode means go!" Yami shouted at me over the wind. I looked at the duel disk attacked to my arm, and couldn't help but wonder.

"What does defence mode mean?" Yami was about to answer, when suddenly the card blew off the duel disk, caught in the wind. And for the second time I'd ridden with Yami, we fell to the ground.

By some miracle, we landed on the shallow muddy part of the bank. I sat up and looked over at Yami. The pharaoh had landed face down in the mud, and I was afraid he'd injured himself but he pushed himself up, wiping mud out of his eyes. Yami looked over at me, and I couldn't help but laugh at his expression. There was mud all over his face except where he'd wiped it off his eyes. I kept laughing and Yami just groaned, before burying his face in the mud again.

"We're going to need to make some improvements." Suddenly Yami's head shot up and he looked at me.

"Please tell me you caught the card."

"Um..." I didn't really know what to say. We were falling out of the sky, No I did not have time to catch a trading card. "I... didn't catch it." Yami looked at me like I'd just committed a crime. He quickly sat up and washed the mud off his face, before running out of the mud.

"Alright, did you see where it went?" I'd never seen Yami so stressed out, and over a card. I stood up and tried to wipe some of the mud off.

"I think it was over there." I pointed to a patch of grass and Yami walked over, getting on his knees and looking for the card. I walked over and tried to help, if the card meant that much to him. After 10 minutes of searching Yami sighed relieved, picking the card up. I held back a laugh; he looked so relieved and glad.

"It's just a card, isn't it?" Yami looked over at me, and looked like I'd just asked him the world best kept secret.

"Yeah, just a card." Yami stood up, walking off looking kinda sad. I decided it would probably be best to leave now.

"Well...see ya tomorrow."

"See ya."

* * *

**CODH: *can now die happy***

**Ryou: Yay we got 100 reviews!**

**Yami Bakura: 101 to be exact**

**CODH: I'd like to thank the reviewers, and those who didn't review, and my sisters who let me take up their computer time, and my dog and-**

**Yami Bakura: Shut up**

**Ryou: And save the thanks til the end of the fic, note you're not even half way**

**CODH: I know, I'm working on it *keeps tying***


	15. Flowers?

I walked into the game shop and looked at the clock. Since I'd left Yami slightly earlier than usual, I had a few hours to myself. But what to do with that time? I sighed; first I would need to get out of these clothes, the once blue leather hidden under layer upon layer of mud. After getting changed and having a quick shower, I sat down on the soft couch, thinking of what to do next. My brain and my bruises acted as one and came up with a brilliant idea. _I really need to figure out a way to stop falling off. _

A light bulb turned on over my head and I ran to Pegasus fort. Even though the old man only made duel monster cards he still had a few bits and pieces lying around the old store, and being his apprentice he told me I could go around anytime. This was good; because I had a gut feeling it was going to be a long night.

First; I needed to figure out a way to keep cards from flying off my duel disk, and after seeing the way Yami acted today he'd probably prefer them to be protected from the elements at the same time. After some looking around I found old plastic sleeves, and after a bit of meddling I managed to stick one cover over all 5 of the monster slots on my duel disk, while leaving the hologram generator clear for scanning the cards. When another question popped into my mind.

_How is it Yami can ride the Duel Monsters like they were solid? _

And of course, that opened a million other questions._ Why is it duel monsters only inflict real damage around millennium spirits? Why is it they are harmless whenever he just duel against friends, or in tournaments? Does it have something to do with the millennium items?_

I sighed, so many questions to life, and most will never be answered. One final question entered my mind and I said it aloud, for it was one I knew would be puzzling me until I found the answer...if I ever did.

"I wonder, is it only this duel disk or does it work with any duel disk I use?"

"Does what work with any duel disk you use, Yugi-boy?" I nearly jumped out of my own skin, turning to see the one eyed maniac himself right behind me.

"Pegasus don't sneak up on me like that!" The silver haired man rolled his eye.

"Just what exactly are you doing up so late, and here of all places?" I tensed, before mentally cursing. I really needed to start thinking of excuses before people ask me the question.

"Um...well with winter on the way and...I thought it would be ...best to make sure my cards were protected at all times."_ I was lying through my teeth, but Pegasus didn't seem to notice._

"Yes...wouldn't want a repeat of last year."

"You don't have to bring that up every five seconds!"

"Yes but I still can't believe you put an entire deck through a washing machine." I face palmed. The most embarrassing moment of my life. "And there were pieces of Exodia in it!"

"Only three!" Pegasus sighed, before looking at his watch.

"You should be getting home Yugi-boy. It may be a later class, but you'll be sleeping til wee hours of the afternoon staying up this late at night." I raised my eyebrows.

"Late class?"

"Yes Yugi-boy, as in a class we have in the afternoon instead of the morning." I grinned; the later start meant I would probably get to see Yami earlier.

"That's great!"

"Yes, maybe you'll be on time for once. Now buzz off!" I ran out of the store, before running back to get my duel disk. Pegasus shot me a one eyed glare, but I still got the disk and ran home. Too lazy to change into my pyjamas', I collapsed on the bed before crawling under the blankets, welcoming the warmth they supplied. _Does Yami get cold at night?_ I sighed; maybe I'd ask him tomorrow. But for now, I could barely keep my eyes open._.._

* * *

"Ready?"

"Ready." The dragon took off, and I held my breath...praying not to fall off. And for the first time in history, we actually managed to fly out of the valley without falling.

"Well I guess that's progress." Yami sat in front of me controlling the dragon, and deep down I knew he was loving every second of it. He looked down over the land below us, and the grin on his face was a little unsettling. "Yugi, put the card in defence mode." I looked at the duel disk on my arm_, Dark Blade the Dragon Knight, _summoned in attack mode.

"What does defence mode do again?" Yami looked over at me, grinning.

"Find out." I thought about it, before switching the card into defence mode_._ The dragon's wing closed in closer to its body, and before I could scream we were diving down to the ground. I held onto Yami, who appeared to be enjoying the dive...until he realised what we were about to crash in.

"Yugi...put the card in attack mode." My eyes blurred with the wind created by the speed we were going at, and I felt the air being drawn from my chest. "NOW YUGI!"

We crashed into the field, me being thrown away from Yami in the impact. I sat up and realised we'd landed in a field of...flowers. I inhaled, enjoying the smell when I heard Yami swearing in many different languages. I followed the sound of his voice and found the pharaoh a few metres off_, _holding his nose and still cursing.

"What is it?"

"Flowers!" I tilted my head to the side confused.

"Flowers?" Yami glared at me, accidently moving his hand from his nose.

"When Millennium Spirits, as you call them, smell flowers..." Yami stopped talking, and looked at me. The look on his face was almost that of a drunk, when suddenly he fell backwards.

"Yami!" I ran over to him and saw the steady rise and fall of his chest telling me he was still breathing. Looking more closely, I started laughing. The great pharaoh...sleeping like a baby. I looked at the purple plants surrounding us and picked a handful. Lavender. Grinning, this could come in handy. Yami murmured something in his sleep and I groaned, realising my newest problem.

"Please don't tell me I need to drag you all the way back!" No comment from Yami. I sighed and took the card off my duel disk, the dragon vanishing and Yami returning to his usual leather pants and black tang top, no more heavy black armour.

_I wonder what happened to that blue jacket he used to have?_ I shook the question out of my head, grabbing Yami's feet and started dragging him towards what I hoped was the end of the field. Yami may have looked light...but just a tip for if you ever need to drag someone through a field. Looks can be _deceiving._

After dragging Yami for about 10 minutes, I noticed the flowers were beginning to lessen in number. Yami started to stir and I dropped his feet, standing a little away from the spirit. Slowly he pushed himself up and looked over at me, before groaning like he'd just woken up from the worst hangover ever. I felt a small smile grace my lips, but tried to hide it from Yami.

"Take note Yugi, if you put the card in defence mode with the top of the card going left, the monster will dive to the left. If the top of the card is pointing right..._"_

"You dive to the right?" Yami nodded, just about ready to fall asleep again and I couldn't help myself from asking. "What do you give a Millennium Spirit on Valentine's day?" Yami groaned, shaking his head.

"Be quiet." Yami tried to stand up but tripped over his own two feet. I ran over and managed to help stop him from completely falling. "I **HATE** flowers."

"Understandable." I helped Yami stand up, and with him leaning on me for support we managed to exit the flower covered hell. "Just one of those days that makes you want to stop and smell the roses?" Yami sighed; playfully hit me over the head.

"Alright, if we fly back then you run you'll make it back on time for class." I looked at my watch, seeing I had about 10 minutes before class started.

"FUUUUUUUDGE!"

* * *

**CODH: I never know how I will thank everyone for the reviews**

**Yami Bakura: Shut up**

**CODH: I'm being grateful!**

**Yami Bakura: Then be grateful quietly**

**CODH: Flowers?**

**Yami Bakura: Only works in your fanfics**

**Ryou: I know…it's a shame**

**Yami Bakura: Why do I bother?**

**CODH: Because you have no choice**


	16. Just Messing Around

Running over to the arena, I saw the others waiting outside and sighed relieved. At least I made it this time, even through I only had a few seconds to spare. Ryou saw me and walked over, looking awfully amused by my panting.

"Looks like you just ran a marathon Yugi." I shook my head, sweat dripping down.

"My legs aren't made for running...actually I don't know what they're made for." Ryou laughed and Pegasus showed up to unlock the arena. Before most of us had walked in, a Bakura spirit had been released from its cage and was already having fun trying to kill us before we summoned a creature. Duke was already hobbling outside and Tristan followed his brother, claiming to be 'making sure he was alright'. Tea hadn't even shown up for class and Joey just got himself thrown across the arena.

The Bakura looked right at me and charged. I closed my eyes and tensed, holding out my hand and hiding the flowers under my fingers. The creature almost attacked but stopped right in front of me. I opened my eyes as the Bakura fell over in a deep sleep. I slowly sidestepped round the creature, trying to ignore the growing crowds above. I had almost walked past the sleeping spirit but stopped when something caught my eye and I stopped, holding back a laugh. The Bakura, soundly sucking its thumb in its sleep.

"Class dismissed. Excellent work Yugi-boy!" We all left the large stadium, but unlike usual everyone was surrounding me.

"That was amazing!"

"I've never seen a Bakura do that!" I realised that since class was so short, I would be able to see Yami again in I hurried.

"Um...I left my deck in the arena. You guys go on ahead; I'll catch up with you later." I turned around and almost ran into Kaiba, before weaving around the older boy and running towards the large building we'd all just exited to try and make my story believable. If I'd turned around, I would've seen Ryou and Kaiba shoot each other the 'something's not right with him' look. But I was too busy trying to figure out the fastest way to Harpies Point.

* * *

"Hey Yami!" The pharaoh looked up from his cards, which he'd been going through for who knows how long.

"Yugi, to what do I owe the pleasure of seeing you again?"

"Class was unusually short today. Want to know why?" Yami suddenly looked over at me wide eyed, and motioned for me to stop walking.

"You used flowers to knock out the spirit and I know that because there still in your pocket!" I reached into my pocket and felt the purple flowers brush against my fingers.

"Woops..." I walked back up the path and threw the flowers away. Making sure they didn't come back in the valley's direction, I walked back down the trail.

"Hey Yami!" He sighed, rolling his eyes as I sat to his left. "Sorry, but how did you know they were in my pocket?"

"Flowers are like smoke, you can smell them in the air but as long as you don't get too close you won't suffocate...or in my case fall asleep." I thought about the answer, before coming up with another question.

"Then why didn't you notice when we crashed?"

"Two reasons, A) We were flying _with_ the wind so the smell was blown away from us and B) I was expecting to go left, and didn't look to my right until you drove us into it." I almost laughed at the mistake I'd made just this morning.

"Sorry about that." Yami sighed.

"I guess it was partly my mistake. But we should both be more careful, it could've turned out much worse." I frowned.

"How?"

"Sometimes you hear stories about younger spirits accidently crashing into fields much like that one, and falling asleep. They can't wake up because there constantly surrounded by the plants, and no-one can go get them out or else they'll end up just like them. So they just lay there sleeping... slowly dying."

"Oh..." We sat in silence for a minute or two...almost as if remembering the unfortunate ones. Yami broke the silence, and I wish I had recorded the following line.

"Well, I guess you kinda saved me back there so...um..." Yami made a coughing sound, but I defiantly heard him mutter 'Thank you' under his breath.

"What was that?" Yami looked away from me, almost ashamed of himself.

"I didn't say anything." I started laughing, and Yami rolled his eyes. Sometimes he really did just act like a kid, and even though I hadn't known him for long it just seemed so out of character!

"What? What's so funny?" Yami gave me a serious look, and I felt my eyes watering.

"You act like such a little kid at times!"

"What do you mean sometimes? For all you know I could run around chasing butterflies and making daisy chains." I immediately stopped.

"Do you?" He gave me the 'what do you think' look and I just sighed, lying down to try and stop myself from giggling. Yami skipping around making daisy chains...

"Do spirits have any other general weaknesses?" Yami raised his eyebrows at the question.

"Why should I tell you?" I gave him a look that has never failed me before, puppy eyes.

"Pwease?" Yami sighed, before scooting closer to me. He stuck his thumb out and placed it just below my ear.

"There." He moved his hand and I rubbed my neck.

"So what does that do exactly?" Yami seemed to hesitate, before telling me.

"A gentle tap there will knock any spirit out cold. Not just asleep, unconscious...as in you attack until dead they won't wake up. Takes at least an hour or two to wear off...and it only works on their right side."

"Really?"

"Yeah, but try not to use it too much." I couldn't help but grin, trying to casually put my arm around Yami's neck. But of course the pharaoh noticed, standing up.

"No you don't." My grin widen as I stood up.

"Come on Yami." Yami smirked, before running off.

"If you can catch up to me!" I smiled, chasing after the spirit. But even just on foot, he was much faster than me. Yami played with me like a cat with a ball of yarn, letting me close enough to catch up to him before sprinting off again. But it was pretty fun, and I swore sometimes I almost reached him without him noticing. Yami darted around a tree my following, but I didn't see some of the roots sticking out of the ground and tripped, bringing Yami down with me. It took us both a second to realise what had happened, but i managed to jump closer to Yami before he got up.

"You're not getting away this time!"

"No Yugi don't!" I tried to reach for Yami's neck while he hit my arms away. We were both laughing the whole time, and after 5 or so minutes I gave up.

"You win." Yami smirked arrogantly.

"I always win." I rolled my eyes. Neither of us went to get up, so we just lay under the tree silently enjoying each other's company.

"It was pretty cool when the Bakura fell asleep; no-one knew how I did it."

"Really?" Yami's voice wasn't sarcastic at all, he sounded genuinely surprised by the fact.

"Yeah, I doubt anyone else even knows spirits fall asleep around flowers."

"Seriously? No one's ever wondered why we clear of the florist or any places with flower beds?"

"Nope. I guess since things can be destroyed from a distance they never made the connection." I heard Yami chuckle, and mumble something like 'Stupid humans'. But I didn't protest, because looking back on it I realised it was a pretty big thing to just overlook. It's not like everyone had tonnes of flowers, but places that did were rarely robbed or burned down. While I was thinking, I remembered something I'd been meaning to ask Yami for a while now.

"Do you ever get cold here?" I looked over at the pharaoh, who looked back at me.

"What makes you ask?"

"Just curious." I shrugged, rolling onto my back.

"Well...to be honest it's an improvement from where I usually stay, so I'm gonna have to say no."

"That's good." I sighed, looking at the horizon. The sun was beginning to set, causing the clouds to paint the sky in pink and bright orange. It was a beautiful sight, but like anything nice it came with a hidden catch. I'd have to leave now unless I wanted to walk home in the dark. I groaned quietly, standing up.

"I better go." Yami nodded, standing as well.

"Yeah, see you tomorrow."

"Yep, bye." I walked out of the valley and started heading home.

* * *

**Yami Bakura: I do not suck my thumb!**

**CODH: Yes you do!**

**Yami Bakura: You have no evidence!**

**CODH: *pulls out video camera***

**Yami Bakura: You taped me sleeping?**

**CODH: I didn't want to lie to the readers**

**Yami Bakura: -_- I hate you**

**CODH: You're the one that told me flowers only make you sleep in the fanfic**

**Yami: That didn't mean write about it!**

**CODH: Really? ;)  
**


	17. Ryou Red Handed

It was really starting to get dark by the time I got back into town. The smile was still on my face and I thought about earlier, just messing around with Yami. It would be nice if we could just spend more days like that, but we both had more important things to worry about. For me, it was not dying in Pegasus ridiculous training and for Yami; well...I guess it was getting back to the lair. I shuddered at the thought, after spending so long with Yami sometimes it was hard to believe he really was a Millennium spirit, let alone one of the most feared ones. I was almost at the game shop, when I walked past the arena and saw the door wide open. Pegasus never forgot to lock the door, and even if he did he'd never leave it wide open. My mind told me to ignore it but my curiosity got the better of me.

As quiet as physically possible, I crept through the door. The light were still off and it looked like no one was here, but I listened anyway. The sound of gentle footsteps came from the stairway to Pegasus 'throne'. I held my breath, walking over to the stairs. I turned to face the culprit, and almost passed out relieved.

"Ryou what are you doing here?" I hissed. The albino nearly jumped out of his skin, looking over his shoulder at me.

"Yugi don't scare me like that!" he whispered.

"Sorry. Just what are you doing here?" We both kept our voices to a whisper, since in the near silent arena we could hear each other fine without the need to raise them. Ryou sighed, before motioning upstairs.

"Come on." he started running upstairs, two at a time, and I had no choice but to follow him and make sure he didn't do anything crazy. But hey, crazy things...nothing new right?

"Ryou, we really shouldn't be doing this." By the time I caught up to the older boy he was already standing in Pegasus' booth, leaning as far as possible over the rail without falling over. A notebook was in his left hand and a pen in his right, his eyes shining.

"Amazing aren't they?"

"Amazing?" I followed Ryou's gaze, and gasped. From above you could see the whole arena, but that wasn't the best part. You could see inside the cages where the spirits were kept. There were the common spirits, and some less common...and some I don't think I could even name.

A Dartz was pacing around its cage, a Rex and a Weevil spirit duelling each other through cages. But the cutest scene was a Bakura and a Marik, curled up asleep in the corner next two each other, a wall of iron bars separating them.

"It's amazing, I mean everyone says they're so vicious but if you actually manage to find them when they don't feel threatened...they socialize and play just like humans do. It's so confusing; you just don't know what to believe anymore." I looked between the cages; the spirits looked like they were all in prison cells.

"Why am I suddenly ashamed to be human?" Ryou laughed at me.

"I felt the same way." He closed the book and passed it to me, and I couldn't help but notice how similar it was my own. Sketches with notes here and there, messy yet perfectly organised. "But if I managed to get enough evidence, to prove that not all Millennium spirits are as dangerous as they appear, we wouldn't have to fight these wars all the time.

I looked at Ryou in amazement. The boy who had been so sure the pharaoh was evil doing so much to prove Millennium spirits aren't all guilty.

"What 'inspired' you to do this?" Ryou chuckled, before looking back over the arena.

"I just don't think it's fair that spirits are judged as a whole. It's like saying one person commits a crime so you need to throw all humans in jail." I knew my next question would lead to a very difficult conversation, but I had to ask.

"Do you still think pharaohs are bad?" Ryou frowned, but seemed to understand what I was really asking.

"If a person commits a crime, you don't through the whole human race in jail. You take that one individual to court, analyse the case and then reach a verdict. I've...seen the evidence, and have already made my decision. Guilty." Straight away I knew what Ryou was talking about, his mother and little sister. I smiled sadly, before trying to lighten the mood.

"Aren't there usually 12 on a jury?" Ryou laughed, shaking his head.

"You certainly are a strange one Yugi Moto." Ryou looked down again, eyes wide. "Book please." I gave him back the notebook, and automatically he turned to the page he wanted. Reading over his notes, Ryou pointed down to the two duelling spirits.

"Now...if history repeats itself-" Suddenly the brunette threw his cards in the air, while the green haired spirit grinned, letting out a laugh that almost made my ears bleed. Ryou grinned.

"Yep, Weevil won. Rex chucks a fit and then Weevil let's out that horrible laugh." I winced.

"Horrible is an understatement." Ryou looked back at me and nodded, seemingly glad to have company for his late night studying.

"Yeah, I'm trying to decide if it is to alert the other spirits of his victory or knock out any human to close."

"Both, easily both." Ryou considered the opinion, before facepalming.

"Of course! If he was duelling a human and won, that laugh would knock them out if they somehow survived losing and then alert other spirits they were being attacked! You're a genius Yugi." I grinned.

"Thank you, I do try. But then why aren't we unconsious?" Ryou thought for a minute.

"Only as close range?" I shrugged and Ryou skim read the page, before looking up and gasping. I turn to face the final two cages. The Bakura had put its arms through the sleeping Marik, who'd somehow fit its head through the iron bars and was resting on the Bakura's lap. I groaned.

"Why must they make me feel so terrible for being human?" Ryou just sighed.

"And that brings me to the only question I cannot answer." I looked at the boy in curiosity, and he understood the message.

"They're superior to us in practically every way. Strength, agility, endurance. They could easy kill us all and never have to put up with this again." Ryou motioned to the cages, and I realised it was true. "Yet they don't. They endure the pain, but why? Could it be they don't really want to steal from us? Or is it because they think they have enough blood on their hands? Or do they truly fear us?" I looked at Ryou, and shook my head.

"Why must you do this to me Ryou? Now I need to know!" Ryou grinned, before checking the time on his cell phone.

"Sounds like we both do. But for now, sleep awaits." I looked at his phone and saw it was just past 11.

"Yeah, more training tomorrow." We both made long faces.

"Great." I started walking downstairs and Ryou followed me. Suddenly, we both froze and my blood ran cold.

"Hello? Is anyone in here?" _Pegasus. _Ryou ran over to the wall and slammed his fist against it. I turned to his wide eyed._ Is he trying to get us caught? _But then, to my amazement, the wall shifted and revealed a small passage. Ryou ran through and I quickly slipped into the passage as closed, leaving no trace we'd ever been there.

"Hello?" We could still here Pegasus through the wall, and Ryou motioned silently for us to start walking. Using his phone light, we walked through the pathway for roughly 10 or so minutes, before Ryou came to a halt. He tapped the ceiling and then pushed it out, before climbing through the hole and then helping me out. I looked around and couldn't believe where we'd come up.

"The fort?" Ryou dusted off his cloths.

"Yep, it's an old passage they used when they first built the arena." My eyes widen.

"That would make it over 120 years old!" Ryou grinned.

"True that. Well...I best be off. See ya Yugi!" Ryou walked out of the small workshop and I thought for a minute, before leaving myself. I walked into the game store before collapsing on the couch, too tired to walk upstairs. The fire was still roaring, and I fell asleep looking at the orange flames dancing on the black charred wood.

* * *

**CODH: Ryou chapter!**

**Ryou: I am a bit of a nerd aren't I?**

**CODH + Yami Bakura: *nod head* Yep**

**CODH: But that's what we love about you *glomp***

**Ryou: *can't breathe* Please let me go**

**CODH: If we get a review I let you live**

**Yami Bakura: For the sake of my Hikari, please review**

**CODH: I LOVE ALL YOU READERS!**


	18. Near Death Experience

_Beep. Beep. Beep._

I groaned, looking over at the clock on the table nearby. I don't remember setting an alarm?

"Good morning Yugi." I screamed sitting up and looking to the left where the voice came from. Ryou stood in the doorway grinning, holding an alarm clock.

"Ryou what are you doing here?" I yelled. The albino just smiled, in that way that makes you think he had some form of evil plan up his sleeve.

"Just thought you might enjoy a wakeup call. After all, class starts in about...10 minutes?" I looked over at the clock, before cursing and running upstairs to get my deck. I could hear Ryou laughing downstairs and rolled my eyes, whilst trying to put on my shoes.

"NOT FUNNY!" The laughter increased and I ran downstairs, dragging Ryou out the door with me. We both ran over to the massive arena, arriving at the exact same time as Pegasus. The silver-haired man rolled his... eye.

"If you two are late again I'm going to have to give you extra classes or something." I panted, and Ryou laughed at me while panting himself.

"Not...technically...late." Pegasus sighed, before unlocking the stadium. We all lined up, but instead of releasing the daily spirit Pegasus turned to us.

"Now, we're reaching the end of your training, and from henceforth one student will be kicked out every class." Everyone tensed as Pegasus walked down the line, examining us like an executioner. He came back to where we could all see him, an emotionless look on his face.

"Anzu, you're out." The girl looked up from filing her nails, before grunting and walking outside. Everyone watched her leave in amazement, shocked that Pegasus wasn't joking. "Alright, on with schedule." The old man walked over to the nearest cage and unlocked the door, and Ryou and I held back a laugh. The spirit, commonly called a Rex Raptor, attempted to make itself look scary...and failed. It immediately summoned a Giant Rex monster, and everyone scattered as the dinosaur tried to make us his dinner. Ryou and I ran to the left and were separated from the others, which wasn't very smart. The rex looked between the two groups and didn't even hesitate, charging at us. Natural instincts kicked in and I summoned the first monster I drew, Feral Imp. Ryou seemed to have the same idea, summoning White Magical Hat. The dino went to swallow one of the monsters, but seemed to hesitate as if trying to decide which monster would be tastier. When it finally attacked, my Feral Imp easily evaded the slower monster.

Ryou and I were running back to the others, when suddenly Ryou cried out and fell over.

"Ryou!" I went to help the older boy and couldn't help but look over to the dinosaur, where my worst fears were answered. The giant rex was definatly chewing on something...and the discarded white top hat on the ground told the rest of the tale. Ryou's life point count went down to 3000 as Tristan came over and helped the albino up. Ryou insisted on telling everyone he was fine, but I wasn't so sure.

"Ryou..." The said boy looked me straight in the eye and looked just about ready to slap me.

"Yugi. I. Am. Fine. You would be more worried about yourself."

"Myself?" I almost didn't know what Ryou meant, when an excruciating pain ran through my body. Holding back a scream I fell to the ground, realising what Ryou meant. Looking over my shoulder, I saw the Giant Rex happily eating away at something I could only guess was my Feral Imp. Everyone, except Kaiba, winced as the dinosaur spat out a horn like it was a toothpick. The dino turned to Ryou and I as everyone ran for their skins, but neither of us could get up. The Giant Rex opened its mouth ready to swallow as Ryou and I screamed, grabbing onto each other. Silvia leaked from the dinosaur's mouth, but Ryou and I were both too scared to scream as the spit hit us both. My life flashed before my eyes as the Giant Rex went to finish us off, but before it could finish shattered like glass, falling to the ground like dust. Both still screaming, Ryou and I looked up and saw a Judge Man, Kaiba standing nearby smirking. Our screaming slowly got quieter as Pegasus herded the Rex Raptor back into its cage.

"Well, that certainly was entertaining." The one eyed man turned to us students, Kaiba to be specific. "Nice work Kaiba. Now, are you two okay?" Pegasus turned to Ryou and me. The albino started to giggle under his breath while I sighed, before lying on the ground.

"We're fine, thanks for asking." I'd like to think the sarcasm was obvious, but Pegasus didn't seem to notice. Ryou's laughter slowly grew until there were tears running down his face and we all stared at the boy, eyebrows raised.

"I...I...I'm sorry...it's just-" Ryou took a minute to try and stop laughing, but was unsuccessful. "Laughing is how I deal with stress!" Most shrugged before walking out of the arena, but I stayed...making sure the albino didn't suffocate. I held out a hand, before helping Ryou up. Slowly the laughter decreased, but Ryou was still giggling as we left the stadium.

"That is one weird way to deal with stress." Ryou shook his head, grinning ear to ear.

"I know, but it works." I sighed, before looking at the time.

"Ah not good. I'd love to chat Ryou but I am very late for something." Before the teen could protest I was running off. "See ya!"

* * *

Yami POV

The dragon carefully turned, following the wind. Yugi had his arms wrapped loosely around me, and hadn't said a word since we'd left the ground. I know I shouldn't have cared but I couldn't help it.

"Are you okay Yugi?" The smaller boy sat up straight and made a small sound 'hm', before his mind registered the question.

"Oh...yeah I'm fine. Just...thinking." I looked over my shoulder and raised an eyebrow at the boy, who stayed quiet for a while before wrapping his arms around me tighter. "Today was the first time I took battle damage." My eyes widen slightly, but Yugi didn't see.

"Oh..." The dragon rose higher into the sky and I was forced to look away from Yugi. We were both quiet for a few minutes, before I broke the silence. "I remember the first time I was hit." Yugi raised his head and I could tell he wanted to hear more. "I was a lot more scared than I'd like to admit. My whole life I was told that humans were savage, and if they landed a single attack on you, you were dead." Yugi chuckled behind me.

"You know, I was told the same thing." I shook my head at the irony of the situation, but continued.

"So I was lying there terrified and half expecting that day to be my last, when you'd never guess who walked out of woods." Yugi leaned forward so I could see him out the corner of my eye.

"Who?" The smirk grew on my face.

"You." I felt Yugi lean backward too fast in shock, and for a second I thought he might fall off the dragon...not that it would be a first.

"Me?" I nodded. "So spellbinding circle was the first time you ever got hit by anything."

"Yep." Yugi fell silent in thought, and I almost laughed at his next statement. "You didn't seem that scared when I saw you."

"Yeah, but that's because as soon I saw you I was almost 100% sure you wouldn't have the guts to kill me, but then again when you summon the dark magician-" Yugi gave me a light shove.

"Yes yes, I get it. I was there too." I laughed under my breath, while Yugi shook his head. "How can you look back on that and laugh?"

"Because now that I look back on it I realise how stupid it was to be scared."

"Hey!" I laughed harder, before looking back at Yugi.

"Alright, I bet my deck that if you ever found me injured again you wouldn't be able to kill me." Yugi glared at me.

"Deal." We flew as normal for a minute, before I grinned and Yugi noticed the flaw in that bet. "Hey, if I killed you then I could take your deck anyway."

"And if you don't I get your deck."

"That's not fair!"

"That's life." I could almost sense Yugi pouting behind me.

"...How many wins is that for you?"

"Lost count." I looked over at the horizon and saw the sun was starting to get low in the sky. "We should probably land or you'll be walking home in the dark."

"Okay." 10 minutes later we were both back on solid ground. Yugi was about to start walking back to Domino City, when something crossed his mind.

"Since trap cards don't really count as battle damage would I be right in saying you've never really lost life points?"

"Yes, that statement would be correct." Yugi thought for a second, before speaking.

"Does that make me more experienced than you?" I smirked.

"No, it just makes me better at avoiding danger than you." Yugi rolled his eyes and almost left, but I wasn't finished talking. "And for the record I am stronger than you, faster than you, smarter than you, in my opinion more handsome than you and-"

"Yami?"

"Yeah?"

"Shut up." I laughed, and could tell by the tone in Yugi's voice he wasn't taking me seriously. The shorter boy started to walk off and I grinned.

"Always nice to see you too Yugi!"

"I SAID SHUT UP!"

* * *

**CODH: *crying***

**Ryou: *pats on back***

**Yami Bakura: What's up with you?**

**CODH: *blows nose* My report came back and from now on I only get one hour of computer a week**

**Yami Bakura + Ryou: WHAT? !**

** CODH: I know, but for now unless I can find a way around this ban chapters will be coming up very slowly**

**Ryou: Noooooo**

**CODH: I'm not giving up on this story, just slow updates from now on...Sorry!**

**Yami Bakura: Like they weren't slow enough as it was -_-  
**


	19. Yami has a Heart, Debatable

The remaining six of us all gathered out front the arena, patiently waiting for Pegasus to come and 'open shop'. When he finally arrived, I think everyone was surprised to see him armed with a duel disk and deck… and I knew today wasn't doing to just be a walk in the park. Unlocking the door, we all followed the older man into the stadium. The twins, Duke and Tristan, were about to walk in when Pegasus turned to them.

"Now boys, it was very hard to pick between the two of you, so I've decided to kick you both out. Maybe next year." The twins had identical looks of shock on their faces, but Pegasus shut the door never the less, leaving them outside. "Now on with the program." The teacher turned back to all of us and we all stood straight and tensed, like soldiers going to war.

"This will be one of the toughest lessons yet, and if anyone were to die in this training it will be today." I felt my eyes widen and everyone else had the same reaction... even Kaiba. "Today, you duel a Gozaburo, and I felt it was only fair to give you a warning." Ryou stepped forward, and I swore he was paler than usual.

"Mr. Pegasus, sir, I seriously doubt that anyone here is ready to duel a spirit that powerful." The older man glared at Ryou, who stepped back beside me. I leaned closer and whispered to the albino.

"What does a Gozaburo do exactly?" I did partly know why Gozaburo was one of the most feared next to a pharaoh, but it always reassured me to hear it from Ryou, because with Ryou it's straight from the book.

"Gozaburo emit a black mist-like substance, and somehow the fog gets into your head and makes your mind think that the Gozaburo is whatever you fear most." I gulped, and Ryou nodded. "It's all self-defence, you're less likely to engage it in battle and if it corners you you're too scared to fight back." Ryou and I looked back to the others and realised that everyone was silent, listening to us. Pegasus nodded, and for the first time ever I regretted asking.

"That's a fairly accurate description, and now you all understand why it's one of the final spirits you duel. Once I release the spirit you have 5 minutes to try and defeat it, but if it gets too dangerous or you run out of time then I'll come in and finish it off." One or two of us nodded solemnly, but I was too busy thinking of what I would see. _What is my deepest fear? _My mind flashed back to when I was a little kid and I shuddered. If I was lucky, my parents wouldn't walk out of that cage, and stay in my nightmares where they belonged. Pegasus walked over to a large silver cage, but unlike the others the walls were made of sheet metal, leaving whatever was contained invisible to the human eye.

"Get ready." The lock came off, and before I even had a chance to glimpse inside the cage the whole arena filled with black. Not like smoke, but as if night had come and it was new moon. Not a ray of light made its way through the fog, and I was lucky to even see my hand right in front of me. Everyone was silent, and a single pair of footsteps could be heard walking across the concrete floor.

Something to my left whimpered, and I realised it was Ryou, and he was right next to me. Which meant whatever scared him so bad…was also right next to me, if it was close enough for Ryou to see. The footsteps got closer, and I found myself looking in a different direction every 2 seconds trying to locate the source of the sound. I heard running to my left, or was it my right? I don't know. Ryou shouted at me.

"Yugi look out!" Something pushed me over, and I just missed being hit by a Possessed Dark soul. Sighing in relief, I looked into the nothingness.

"Thanks Ryou!"

"Just be careful!" I looked around the darkness, starting to get paranoid with my lack of vision. Talking to myself more so than anyone else, I whispered into the shadows.

"Where are you?"

"I'm right behind you Yugi." My whole body tensed as I whimpered, looking over my shoulder and seeing the frighteningly familiar crimson eyes. A hand reached out to grab me and I ran off into the black, a spine shivering familiar chuckle ringing in my ears. I tripped over as something shifted in the shadows, and crawled backwards until my back came against a wall. The silhouette came closer to me, and even though the only visible feature was the eyes I knew what it was, or who.

"Yami..." I whimpered. I made out a faint smirk on the silhouette's face, and even though my mind screamed to summon a monster to defend myself with my body wasn't listening, my arms refusing to draw a card. 'Yami' came closer to me and I made out the faint glow of the Possessed Dark Soul a few metres away. _This is it...I'm gonna die..._

"Dark Soul atta-!"

"Toon Dark Magician Girl attack!" Before Yami could order the attack, what looked like a small 5 year old girl flew through the air and hit the spirit. Pegasus ran over to me and helped me up, before pushing me back into the darkness. I couldn't see where I was going, but I heard Pegasus and Yami ordering attacks at one another.

"Toon Dark Magician Girl attack!"

"Mirror force!"

"Royal Decree!" A yell of pain came from behind me and I kept running away, though tears streamed from my eyes as I fought every bone in my body not to run back and help Yami. Suddenly something ran past me, and catching a glimpse of white hair I grabbed at the owner's wrist.

"Ryou?" The black seemed to thin out the tiniest bit and I managed to make out a few of Ryou's features, like his eyes that were threatening to over flow.

"No Yugi you don't understand!" Ryou tried to pull away from me and I felt horrible, already knowing what Ryou was probably hearing.

"Ryou, it's not really your sister..." The taller boy stopped pulling for a minute and looked away, as if trying to make sense of the situation.

"I know..." I lightly squeezed the taller boys' wrist when the lights turned on overhead and the room was no longer black. I looked around and held back a scream. Pegasus had Yami slumped over his shoulder, and was about to throw him in the cage with solid walls. I went to run over but Ryou had a sturdy grip on my arm.

"Yugi...it's not real..." My mind processed the information slowly and I found it hard to believe, but then I looked hard at the figure over Pegasus' shoulder it seemed to flicked, like a mirage. I relaxed and Ryou let go of my arm. Something wet rolled down my cheek and I realised I was crying. Wiping the tear away, I noticed so was just about everyone else. Ryou was, and Joey as well. Kaiba wasn't looking at me, but I was sure he was. Even Pegasus seemed to have watery eyes. The longest five minutes of my life played over in my head, and I ran out of the arena before I could completely break down.

* * *

_YamiPOV_

When I heard footsteps coming down into the valley I almost tensed, before turning to see Yugi, looking down at the ground so his hair fell over his face. I sighed, before jumping down from the boulder I had adopted as my chair.

"Yugi." The smaller boy jumped. "What are you doing here so-?" Yugi looked up at me, and I saw the tears streaming down his face. "Yugi?"

"Yami..." Yugi ran over to me and without warning, wrapped his arms around my waist. Almost immediately he started to cry into my shoulder. "Yami..."

"Yugi what are you-?" Yugi held onto me tighter and I decided now wasn't the time to ask questions. I sighed and kissed all dignity goodbye, before rubbing Yugi's back. I couldn't help but grin. "If I could walk into Domino without everyone trying to kill me, I'd probably give that 'teacher' of yours a piece of my mind." Yugi looked up at me, picking up on my little joke.

"Probably?"

"Well, I was raised to steal everything I see...so...might make a few stops." Yugi grinned, before wiping his eyes with his sleeve and letting me out of his little hug. I ruffled his hair and Yugi pushed my hand away, holding back a laugh. "You know what cheers me up?" Yugi rolled his eyes.

"What?"

"Flying...so if you brought your duel disk-" Yugi elbowed my stomach.

"Curse you Yami. I was starting to think you had a heart."

"Hey! I have a heart." Yugi grinned and started walking off.

"You just choose not to use it." The shorter boy laughed and started to walk faster, breaking into a run.

"Yugi get back here! I'm not finished talking to you!" I ran after the pineapple head, who tried to run faster. "Yuuuuuuu-gi!"

* * *

**CODH: And she's back**

**Ryou: 0.o You weren't joking about the time limit**

**CODH: Tell me about it**

**Yami Bakura: Pity pity pity yadda yadda ya, whatever you wanna hear **

**CODH: You missed me**

**Yami: No, my life was absolutely perfect without you**

**CODH: You missed me**


	20. Typical Conversation

After Yami chased me around for a while, pulling me into a headlock until I apologized, we both sat down under the massive weeping willow trees. We'd somehow managed to strike up a conversation, that was about to lead me to finding out information others wouldn't of even dreamed about.

"So...I guess you'd say I'm in the final four, final three if I don't get kicked out tomorrow."

"Wow...Zero to hero. Your parents would be proud." I couldn't help but feel a twinge of sadness, like someone had just pulled on my heart strings.

"Both my parents are dead..."

"Oh..." Yami looked at the ground guiltily. "Was it...?"

"Yeah..." I sniffed a bit, before wiping my eyes free of 'dust'. "A Kisara. But it's okay...I barely knew them."

"...I'm sorry to hear that." Yami looked out over the lake, before chuckling a bit. "It's kind of ironic..." I immediately glared at the spirit. My parents' death was a pretty sensitive subject, and for someone to call it 'ironic'...

"How so?" Yami looked over at me, and seeing the look on my face, eyes widening.

"No no no...Nothing like that! I mean..." Yami pulled out his deck and started shuffling through it, a habit I'd begun to realise as a sign he was nervous. "My parents are dead too." Yami laughed a bit, but I saw him shuffling faster. "And the ironic thing is they were killed by a human." I felt the blood drain from my face as I looked at my feet.

"I'm sorry."

"Nah, it's okay. My life probably turned out better anyway." I gave Yami a curious look, and the pharaoh smirked, knowing he had my attention. "Well, my parents aren't as caring as yours would be. When you're born, if your parents decide they don't want you...you're dead."

"But that's unfair!" Yami looked over at me and grinned, and I felt like a moron.

"That's what most think, but it's life. So...I was lucky from the start. But when my parents died when I was 6, my brother took it upon himself to raise me."

"You have a brother?" I look at Yami wide eyed, and I knew he loved the attention. He's a narcissist, okay?

"Yeah, his name's Atem."

"Older or younger?" The spirit chuckled, as if it was the biggest inside joke ever.

"A few years older. I mean...I'm 16 and he's around 5000."

"HE'S 5000? !" Yami laughed as I looked at him in shock.

"Yeah, you should've known spirits age different to humans."

"Yeah...but-!" Yami continued to chuckle as I tried to do the maths, yet again cursing the subject.

"So yeah, Atem's my older brother. He's the one who..." Yami coughed, to clear his throat. "He's the one who gave me most of my deck." Everything clicked in my mind, as I hit a new level of understanding.

"So _that's_ why you over-reacted when we couldn't find Gaia the Dragon Champion."

"I did not over-react!" I grinned, shaking my head. Yami gave me a look. "That card was one of the first one's Atem gave to me, so it had both actual value and sentimental value." I thought about it, and realised I probably would've acted the same had it been a card Grandpa had given me.

"Ah...now I see." We were both silent for a minute. "I guess he'd be missing you right now." Yami shrugged, finally putting his deck away.

"Maybe, but when someone leaves to try and steal stuff, we're raised to expect they probably won't come back."

"Oh...that's sad...but then again we're taught the same thing." Yami nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, but Atem and I are different. We're the last two 'pharaohs', as you call us."

"Really?" Yami grinned, as if proud of the fact he was special.

"Yep, we're a dying species within a dying species. So we treat each other a little more 'human'. So...who raised you?" I thought about it for a second, before realising I never really thought about it.

"Well...my Grandpa I guess...but I was pretty independent." Yami laughed a little at that.

"Really? You never came across as the independent type." It was my turn to laugh.

"That's what everyone says, but it's true. Best lesson was when I taught myself the stove was hot." Yami cracked up laughing, and even I laughed at my own stupidity.

"Nah, Atem taught me fire was hot without anyone getting burnt."

"Lucky." Once we'd both stopped laughing, Yami sighed.

"So what does your 'Grandpa' say about your schooling?" I shrugged.

"He's currently looking for the spirit's lair, so he'd still think I'm world's worst duelist." Yami looked over at me wide eyed, all traced of humour gone from his face.

"They're looking for the lair?" I hesitated, before nodding. Yami groaned, before lying down on the grass. "So they **_are_** suicidal." I looked at Yami, confused.

"How so?" Yami looked at me, an emotionless look on his face.

"I'd be lucky if they let _me_ live for going back. So a bunch of humans, let alone _Duelists_ trying to go there..." I nodded in understanding, a frown on my face.

"I see what you mean..." Yami sat up and sighed again, looking over to the horizon.

"You should be heading back..." I followed Yami's gaze and saw the sun almost below the horizon, the final light of day leaving a golden glow over the valley.

"Yeah, see ya tomorrow." I went to stand up, but Yami grabbed my wrist.

"Try not to die tomorrow, okay?" I laughed, pulling my wrist away from Yami's grasp.

"Alright, I'll try not to."' Yami grinned as I walked off, and I couldn't help but smile. Even though he could be a jerk sometimes, Yami really was great company.

* * *

**Ryou: That was a pretty fast update**

**CODH: I had it all written in my head, just needed the P.C**

**Bakura: Genius -_-**

**CODH: Now...to do homework**

**Ryou + Bakura: -_-**


	21. The Final Three

Kaiba and I were standing out front the duel arena, and with 5 minutes before class started I was beginning to worry about the other two, Ryou and Joey. Even Kaiba was looking around, more frustrated than usual.

"Where on earth is that mutt?" I looked around hesitantly, before sighing. _If Ryou's late..._

"I'm...I'm gonna go get Ryou." Kaiba rolled his eyes and mumbled something, but as I walked off I couldn't keep the smirk off my face. _Now it's payback time..._

I broke into a sprint, turning down Ryou's street. I slowed to catch my breath, walking down a small garden path towards a cottage. Right I went to knock, a tall man with blue hair walked out. He glared at me and I suddenly felt very small...okay smaller than usual.

"What do you want?"

"Um...I'm Ryou's friend. I just came to make sure he was ready for class." The man sighed, before looking at his watch and swearing.

"Now I'm going to be late!" He ran past me, before turning and yelling, "Ryou's room is down the hallway and to the left!" The older man kept running off and I hesitated for a second, before deciding that probably meant 'Go on inside'. After all, he didn't shut the door behind him. Following the man's instructions, I quietly walked down the hallway before coming to the said door. The sound of faint snoring came from inside and I couldn't help but grin.

"Found you..." I opened the door a crack, before walking inside. Ryou was lying on top of all the blankets, and the fact he was in the same cloths as yesterday told me he'd probably been up all night studying the captured spirits again. The grin on my face widened, and I quickly look around for a clock or something. A small digital clock flashed at me, the alarm having already done off. I fiddled around with it for a second, but it appeared the alarm was broken or something. I sighed, deciding to go to plan B. I shook Ryou gently, because even though the thought of getting even was a nice one I still didn't want either of us to be late.

"Ryou, wake up." The albino groaned, before hitting my hands away and rolling over.

"5 more minutes." I laughed, shaking Ryou again.

"Earth to Ryou, come in Ryou." I albino's eyes opened, and he looked at me for a second.

"Yugi, what are you doing here?" I grinned at him, before it hit Ryou and he jumped up. "I didn't!" I grin widened as I lifted up the alarm clock. Ryou saw the time and swore, jumping up and running to grab his duel disk. I started to laugh, before Ryou started dragging me out of the room.

"Yugi come on, we're gonna be late!" We both raced down the hallway and out the door, me laughing like mad. By the time we both got to the arena, Pegasus was just walking through the door. He saw us running towards him and sighed, shaking his head.

"Whose fault was it this time?" Ryou and I looked at each other, before laughing, realizing this was starting to become routine. Pegasus rolled his eye, going all official and businesslike.

"Well...Welcome to the final three." Kaiba looked around, smirking.

"The mutt got kicked out?"

"No, he approached me after yesterday's class and said he was going to drop out, decided it was too hard for him." I thought about it for a second, thinking about how badly shaken he must of been if he'd actually quit.

"Poor Joey." Pegasus just shrugged.

"He was probably going today anyway. So this is how the final days are going to work." We all stood straighter, these next few days would probably be the most important days of our lives.

"Today is the final group duel, and whoever performs worst will be leaving. Tomorrow, the final two will be duelling each other, and the winner of that duel will get the honour of killing the Kisara." I couldn't help but shudder at the mention of the spirit, and I wondered why my past always came back to haunt me. Pegasus clapped loudly, waking me up from my trip down memory lane.

"I think you'll enjoy today, a real cutie." The cage swang open and I held back a laugh as the short, blue haired spirit walked out. The overly large glasses reflected the sun's light for a second, before blue eyes became visible. The Weevil let out a chuckle from the back of its throat, before drawing a card and summoning a Killer Needle. Ryou summoned a Headless Knight as I summoned King's Knight, both of us subconsciously deciding running was not a good idea. Kaiba drew 5 cards, but decided not to summon anything, since there were already two monsters on the field.

"Yugi, you attack since your monster's stronger." I nodded.

"Okay...King's Knight destroy that Killer Needle!" The knight tensed for attack, before charging at the giant wasp. The sound of metal hitting metal rang out when the sword hit the iron stinger, but the bee quickly dissolved into nothingness. "Alright!" The Weevil snarled a bit at us, before running to the left. Without stopping, it drew a card and summoned an Insect Queen, before the monster reached over with its massive neck and ate my King's knight. I cringed as a sharp pain rang through by body as my life points drop to 3000, and frowned.

"Hey, that was uncalled for!" The Weevil sniggered as Kaiba next to me smirked.

"It's a monster Yugi, it can't be reasoned with." Yami's face flashed in my mind and I shook the hurt look out of my head. _Focus Yugi... _Kaiba summoned a Luster Dragon #2 and destroyed the Weevil's Insect Queen. The green haired spirit let out an almost hiss, before somehow dodging Kaiba's direct attack. Pegasus watched from overhead, clapping.

"That's the idea Kaiba-boy!" The brunette mumbled something in response, as Ryou jogged over.

"If we work together and gang up on it, even if it summons a strong level monster it can't block all of us." Kaiba spoke up.

"What if it uses a form of trap?" I thought about it for a second, remembering the best thing about this particular kind of spirit.

"It's never been recorded that a Weevil had ever used a trap or spell to defend its monsters. I doubt this one will be any different." Kaiba looked up for a second in thought, before his eyes widen.

"LOOK OUT!" The three of us ran back as a Flying Kamakiri almost crushed us all.

"Wow, that was too close!"

"Way too close!" I summoned Jack's Knight and easily destroyed the giant mantis, while Ryou called over to Kaiba.

"It's open!" Kaiba nodded as his dragon prepared for attack, Ryou summoning The Earl of Demise. I looked wide eyed at the boy, the serious look on his face making me think he might actually attack. But Ryou caught my look and winked, and I stopped myself from sighing in relief. If Kaiba attacked with his Luster Dragon #2 it should be enough to just about knock out the spirit, but if the Dragon and one of our monsters then attacked the Weevil would be dead.

"Ready?"

"Ready!" The three monsters charged, catching the Weevil off guard. The spirit managed to summon a Giant Flea and before I could stop it my Jack's Knight destroyed it. Ryou used his Earl of Demise to scare the Weevil into running towards Kaiba, as the brunette attacked with Luster Dragon #2. A nauseating screech rang out through the arena, but when the dust settled I saw the spirit lying unconscious on the floor. Pegasus walked down the stairs clapping as we called back our monsters.

"Congratulations boys, that was brilliant. The teamwork you displayed was excellent; it's almost a shame one of you have to leave today." I felt Pegasus eye fall on me.

"I'm truly sorry, but I'm afraid-"

"I choose to quit." I turned to Ryou in amazement, as did everyone else. Pegasus raised an eyebrow at the albino.

"Are you sure about this?"

"It's my choice, and I've decided that i don't need to be here anymore. Besides, Yugi and Seto are much more capable duellists than me." I heard Kaiba hold back a laugh, but Pegasus sighed, sounding disappointed.

"If you insist, I can't force you to participate. I guess that means Kaiba and Yugi are the final two."

"What?" Kaiba and I were both in shock, but Ryou was just grinning. Kaiba was the first to protest.

"What? Pegasus, this is insanity!" I was in shock, my eyes widened to the point of popping

"You're joking right?"

"This is no joke, and not something that should be taken lightly." The silver haired man walked towards the exit, but the three of us simply stood there.

"I don't believe it."

"Neither do I, but understand this Yugi." I turned to Kaiba, whose eyes were as cold as ice. "I will duel you in two days' time, and I _will_ win."

* * *

**CODH: *lying facedown on couch***

**Ryou: *pats back***

**Yami Bakura: What's with her?**

**Ryou: She's going through card game withdrawl**

**Yami Bakura: Wha?**

**CODH: I HAVE LOST THE WILL TO DUEL**

**Yami Bakura: Ah, why?**

**CODH: My life is crumbling, I went from best and only to worst in a single moment**

**Yami Bakura: Get over it**

**CODH: Shut up, I'm dragging something relatively stupid and pointless on for far longer than needed**

**Yami: Don't expect me to care**

**CODH: I didn't**


	22. Flying equals Falling

I grinned running into the small bowl like valley. Yami was flicking through his deck, and I shouldn't need to tell you where he was sitting. I walked over to the large boulder calmly, but the grin was still plastered on my face.

"Well you seem to be radiating with happiness. Might I ask why?" I jumped at Yami's voice, before groaning.

"Aww, how'd you know it was me?" I couldn't see the Pharaoh's face, but I know he would've been smirking.

"A master thief, you are not." I sighed.

"I guess you're right..."

"But had it been me on the other hand, you'd be-"

"Don't push your luck." Yami shoved his deck into his pocket, before rolling off the boulder. I almost ran over, but the Pharaoh landed neatly on his feet, a perfect 10. I sweatdropped. "Are you part cat or something?"

"Nope, just 100% monster." I frowned, and Yami rolled his eyes, hitting the back of my head what he would've been what he considered lightly. "Don't take everything so seriously. Now, why where so happy again?" I thought for a second, before remembering why'd I'd been so excited to get down to Harpies' point.

"Oh yeah! Guess who's in the semi-finals of duel training?"

"Hmm...anyone but you?" I elbowed the spirit unsatisfied, but Yami laughed. "Congrates, now it's fly time." Yami turned to walk off and I couldn't hold back a chuckle.

"Can you at least pretend to be happy for me?" Yami looked over his shoulder face completely serious, which is probably what gave him away.

"I don't feel happiness."

"Sure you don't." Yami was about to keep walking, when an idea seemed to hit him.

"Hey, let's try something a little different today." I raised an eyebrow at Yami as he threw a card at me. I caught it and saw Curse of Dragon, before the colour rushed from my cheeks.

"No, nononono. No! No..." Yami rolled his eyes, but I could think of a million things wrong with the idea. "No! Just no!"

"Hold this." Yami tossed the millennium puzzle to me, and I hesitated for a second before placing the rope around my neck.

"The answers still no."

"Just think of it as a giant piggy bag."

"No!" Before I could react, Yami grabbed my arm.

"Just relax." Yami grabbed the card from my hand and by the time I realised his intentions it was too late. Yami slipped the card into attack mode and the puzzle reacted. I shielded my eyes, but when the harsh glow died down Yami had vanished. I looked around for the spirit, but he was nowhere to be seen. I quickly scanned the area once more, before hesitantly calling out his name.

"Yami?" No response. A shadow fell over the earth, temporarily taking the sun's warmth from my back. I turned and looked up, but not even a cloud lined the sky. I turned around nervously, before something grabbed me and I was pulled off the ground. Screaming, I looked up and saw a massive black curse of dragon. If the monster could smile, it would be grinning ear to ear. "Put me down put me down put me down put me down!" The dragon made a chuckling sound and I stopped kicking around, glaring. "YAMI PUT ME DOWN!" The ground looked further and further away, the massive trees that stood proud looking like insignificant little green ants.

/Okay.../ Yami get go and I plummeted through the air. I screamed as the ground zoomed up and I saw certain I was going to die. At the last possible second, something dove down and I landed on it instead of the ground. The dragon started to climb again, and I held onto a piece of its heavy black armour to stop me from sliding off. After we'd reached an altitude Yami was happy with, he stopped climbing and we hovered. I caught my breath, and I heard a dull chuckle in the back of my mind.

/Come on, it wasn't that bad/

"I hate you."

/You know you don't/ I sighed, before realising.

"Why can I hear you in the back of my mind?"

/It's called a mind link. They're rare, but not unheard of between spirits. Basically it lets you project your thoughts into the other's mind/

"Really?"

/That's what I heard/I contemplated the idea, before trying it out.

/Yami's a pain in the-/

/I heard that, and I'm gonna make you pay for that/ I laughed, but regretted it. /See that cliff?/ I looked a little to my left, seeing where the ground seemed to end in a sheer drop.

"Yeah, I see."

/We're going over it/

"What?" Yami started to fly faster, heading towards the cliff with hawk like accuracy. I held back a scream while holding on for dear life. The cliff got closer, and at the speed Yami was flying I knew he wasn't bluffing. We went over.

"YAMI I HATE YOU!" I was struggling not to fall forward as we flew vertically down. Waves broke over vicious pointed rocks that looked more like horrid black razor sharp teeth. The water was a murky dark blue with white foam, and for the umpteenth time that day I thought I was going to die. I held onto Yami tighter, and at the last possible second the dragon pulled up. I was hit by a wall of sea spray as the waves came up, lightly soaking my cloths.

/Still alive up there?/

"Barely." I could almost sense Yami mentally smirk, as we rose back into the sky. We flew straight at an even pace and I tried to find a more comfortable position to sit in. Once I did, I actually looked around and tried to enjoy the scenery. Once you were past the rocks, the water was a deep greenish blue. Clouds were scattered everywhere and I grinned as we flew through the white fluff once or twice. Massive rock formations stood up from the water near the cliffs, and I swallowed when I saw we were heading right towards them.

/Defence mode to the left/ I looked to where Yami was hoping to go, and nodded to myself as I turned the card. Wings closing tighter to the body, we dived like a hawk under a naturally made stone bridge. I looked up and saw a flock of white sea birds flying overhead. _Hey I'm getting the hand of this..._

I turned the card back into attack mode, but forgot to shift my weight as Yami tried to turn. We brushed against a rock pillar and I winced.

"Sorry!" Yami rolled his eyes and turned away, but we ended up crashing into another rock.

"Yeah...that was my fault." Yami flicked his head up and basically slapped me, and I glared at him. "Yeah I'm on it!" Yami started to fly up until we were almost vertical and I held back a laugh.

"This is amazing! The wind in my-" Suddenly the plastic cover holding the card tore away, and the card almost immediately followed. "Card!" A faint glow page from the puzzle and suddenly Yami was back in human form, falling through the sky with me. While I was flipping around in all directions, Yami fell calmly with his arms crosses.

"You dropped the card. Congratulations, we're about to fall to our deaths."

"It's not my fault!" Yami sighed, when out of the corner of my eye I saw the card floating on the breeze. Yami saw it as well, yelling at me.

"GRAB IT!" I tried to extend my arm to the card, but it was still too far away.

"Just a little further..." By luck or fate the wind changed, blowing the card over just enough for me to grab it. As quickly as possible I summoned it and the puzzle reacted, Yami managing to catch me just before too late. Forced to go with the wind, we skinned the top of trees that seemed to grow horizontally out of the cliff. While trying to pull up, Yami let out a harsh shrill cry that almost made my ears bleed. I tried to look through the fog and barely made out the maze of rock arches facing us. Holding back a scream myself, I racked my brain for a solution before recollecting my thoughts and trying to find a sturdy place on Yami's back. Yami realised what I was thinking and tensed, preparing to fly with complete precision and accuracy. The first pillar was a metre away from us, and there was no turning back.

* * *

**CODH: *groans* Where's my plot bunny gone?**

**Bakura: *hides dead rabbit* I don't know...**

**Ryou: Oh... great!**

**CODH: *thinks* Oh well...We'll just have to wait for a new one I guess**

**Ryou: The authoress apologizes for the horribly late update -_-**

**CODH: MY PLOT BUNNY IS MISSING!**

**Bakura: *hiding carcass* **

**Ryou: Think, who would want to kill your rabbit?**

**CODH: *thinks* *opens window* MARIK GIVE ME BACK MY PLOT BUNNY!**

**Marik: I don't have it you mental patient!**

**CODH: WHERE'S THAT PLOT BUNNY?**

**Ryou + Yami Bakura: JUST WATCH THE MOVIE!**


	23. Everything I thought I knew

I leaned left and Yami followed the action by angling his body left, and we made it past the first pillar. Yami quickly swerved back right and I tried to keep up; shifting my weight as well as another pillar flew past. I tried to keep as Yami did most of the work. Left, then right. Everything around us was a blur of grey and black rock, but there was something there. Inside, waiting for the moment. I barley thought as Yami seemed to roll in mid-air, not even noticing as the blood rushed to my head and gravity tried to pull me down. We moved in synch, and within seconds we were out of the maze of stone.

The sky seemed to clear as we left the fog, returning to the clear blue we'd seen before. I was panting, and slowly I realised what we'd done. Happiness seemed to be radiating of Yami in waves, and I couldn't help but laugh as I threw my arms in the air.

"Yes!" Closing my eyes as I took in the moment, I felt Yami move under me and looked forward, before my face fell. "Oh come on..." One important thing you should know about spirits. While humans celebrate by cheering and jumping around, spirits celebrate by creating a wall of fire...and flying through it.

* * *

I shuttered, still trying to come to terms with what we'd done. We'd both landed safely on a small cliff that stood off a larder cliff face, and Yami had lit a small fire before sitting down against the rock wall, happily smirking as he looked through the small booster back I'd managed to get from Pegasus. Suddenly he looked up, as if he'd heard something, before shrugging it off and looking at me.

"Mind if I look through your deck?" My eyes widened before I gave Yami a suspicious look, placing a protective hand over my deck as the spirit raised an eyebrow.

"You know if I was going to steal any I would've done it by now."

"True." Even though I knew the pharaoh was right, I refused to hand him the cards. Yami seemed to understand what was going through my head, whether it was because of the mind link or the fact he was just as protective over his cards I'll never know. And I'll never understand what possessed Yami to say what he was about to.

"I'll let you look at my cards?"

"Deal." I knew the chance wouldn't come around again in...ever, so I hesitantly handed over my deck and Yami did the same. As my hands passed over his cards the spirit seemed to flinch, and for a second I thought he was going to pull back his cards, but instead he slid them into my hand.

"One scratch and-"

"You'll tear off my head and cut my eyes out with a rusty fork I know." Yami froze for a second, and I grinned as he realised I used the mind link to find out what he was going to say.

"I was going to say I'd burn your deck in the fiery pits of hell, but either will do." I held back a laugh as Yami tried to cover it up, but one of the positives yet negatives of a mind link is you can tell when the other's lying. I carefully flicked through Yami's deck, and the realisation finally hit me as I came to the last card.

"It's flawless." Yami chuckled and I realised I just fed his ego again, as we handed each other back the other's cards.

"No deck is flawless, but this is as close as they get." I shook my head knowing Yami was a hopeless cause, when the sound was wing beats broke through the quiet solitude.

"Hey Pharaoh!"

"Pharaoh!" I looked up and saw three spirits flying towards us, as Yami growled under his breath. A Bakura, a Marik and a Noa. The first two spirits landed before calling back there 'rides' and walking over to Yami casually, while the latter stood away from the rest, before I realised it was watching me. After a stare off with the shorter spirit, I glanced over to where the other two spirits had gone. Yami hadn't moved, and somehow managed to stand his ground while sitting. The other two towered overhead, but it was obvious which way the picking order went. Yami was in control, and neither the Bakura nor the Marik liked it. The white haired spirit opened his mouth to speak, voice harsh and demanding respect.

"Where've you been, baka pharaoh?" The Marik chuckled, an almost sadistic look in his eyes.

"Yeah, we heard Atem's been worried." The green haired spirit closer to me sighed under his breath, flicking his fringe away from his eyes.

"Yeah, I heard rumour someone saw his crying." The other two spirits laughed harshly, and I saw Yami pull his hand into a fist.

"Big old Temmy crying for his wittle brother." Yami grinded his teeth together, but not letting his anger show to the others.

"You've obviously fallen for one of Gozaburo's little mind tricks again, Bakura. But that's no surprise; you petty thieves aren't particularly bright." The Bakura stepped back in shock and the other's laughed, the Noa whispering 'Burn' to himself. I held back a laugh myself, but I knew being the little human I'd be dead before I could scream.

"You think I'm low! I'm not sitting on my arse associating with that...thing!" The spirit motioned at me and I felt myself flinch, but I should've been used to worse.

"Associating, that's a big word Bakura. Been using that dictionary?" The Marik looked ready to fall in a heap of laughter, as the Bakura fumed. Yami barley noticed. "And anyway, he's better company than you. At least he has more than one functioning brain cell." I felt the corner of my lip turn to a smile, but saw out the corner of my eye the Noa look at me in horror, as if that information made me ten times more dangerous. Yami and 'Bakura' started fighting, as the Marik sat down nearby. I looked to see the Noa watching me again, and sighed. An idea struck me and I slowly reached into my pocket. The Noa drew a card ready to summon, but I saw him relax as I pulled out a booster pack. I hesitated, before tossing the spirit the packet. 'Noa' caught the pack with ease and quickly sat down, tearing open the wrapping. I almost laughed as the green haired spirit looked at the cards with hungry eyes, reading the card descriptions with inhuman speed. When the spirit finished, he looked over me and I smiled softly. Slowly 'Noa' stood, and walked closer to me. I tried not to be bothered by the fact, when the spirit sat next to me.

Before too long I found a green haired head resting on my shoulder, acting as if to be asleep. I could sense Yami mentally laughing as he and the white haired spirit verbally sparred, and I felt like punching him. That's when I caught on to the fact the Marik was watching me, shaking his head in utter disbelief.

"We're meant to be teaching him how dangerous humans are, and we bump into the only human _ever_ that wouldn't try to kill a spirit on sight."

"Oh...sorry?" The spirit laughed at me, and I realised how stupid I sounded. "Never mind."

"Ha! That's brilliant."

"Glad to be of amusement." The spirit stopped laughing, giving me a pleading look.

"The name's Marik. Do I get a booster pack?" I turned my pockets inside out, showing I didn't have anything on me.

"Sorry, walking card stall is out."

"Pity." Marik looked over to the horizon, before standing up and stretching. "We best be off. Up Noa." The spirit who'd been leaning on me shot up and walked over to Marik as quick as possible, as Marik looked over at Yami and the Bakura. Seeing they were still fighting, he sighed. "How do you feel about another buddy?" I glanced over to the other two, knowing the answer already.

"Thanks for the offer, but I'll pass."

"You sure?"

"I insist, you take Fluffy." The spirit laughed again, before walking over and dragging Bakura away by the collar.

"I'm gonna kill you one day Pharaoh I swear!" Yami waved as the spirits summoned monsters and flew off, but not before Noa turned to me.

"See ya Yugi."

"See ya." The green haired spirit stepped onto the back of a Gradius and climbed into the cock pit, before the jet took off following the other two spirits. I watched the three vanished from sight, as my heart fell to my stomach. "Everything we know about you guys is wrong."

* * *

**CODH: *glomping bunny* Hello Mr Plot Bunny the 2nd**

**Yami Bakura: *hitting head against wall***

**Ryou: How'd you get a new rabbit so soon?**

**CODH: You know that saying 'Breed like Rabbits'?**

**Ryou: Who hasn't heard it?**

**CODH: Mr Plot Bunny the 1st turned out to be a Mrs Plot Bunny... But know we'll never run out of plots again!**

**Yami Bakura: How do you feel about rabbit stew? Apparently it tastes like chicken**

**Ryou: No it doesn't, rabbit tastes like rabbit.**

**Yami Bakura: I think you'll find rabbit tastes like chicken, only tenderer**

**Ryou: Why am I having this conversation? I'm a vegetarian!**

**CODH: *covers plot bunny's ears* I know I know...why did I choose them to have as conversation buddies?**


	24. Grandpa's Home

On the other side of domino things weren't going as well. Large ships started docking in the harbour, large holes and scorch marks everywhere. Claws looked like they'd been run up the side of the sea vessels, and it was a miracle they still floated. Everyone silently got off the ship, and it was obvious what had happened. Pegasus sighed as Solomon walked back, before following the older man.

"I trust you found the lair at least."

"Not even close." Grabbing his duel disk, the shorter man sighed. "I hope you had a little more success than me." Pegasus smirked, having been looking forward to telling the grandfather all week.

"Well if you mean by success your parenting troubles are over, than yes!" Solomon turned eyes wide, as a group of citizens ran past.

"Congratulations Solomon, everyone is so relieved!"

"Out with the old and in with the new right?"

"No one will miss that nuisance!"

"The city is throwing a party to celebrate!" The group ran off to tell the others, and Solomon's heart fell to his stomach.

"He's gone?" Pegasus raised an eyebrow, before explaining.

"Um...yes most afternoons, but who can blame him? The life of a celebrity's very rough. He can barely walk through the streets without being swarmed by his new fans." The older chuckled, not believing the news.

"My Yugi?"

"Who would've guessed it? He has this...way with the spirits." Solomon's eyes went wide, before a smile of pride appeared on his face for the first time.

* * *

I face rested on a wooden desk, as I drew scribbles on a once white sheet of paper. Previous drawings of Yami and other spirits littered the table and walls, a long forgotten notebook thrown open with illegible notes on the pages. The lead broke on my pencil and I sighed, looking at the drawing of Noa I didn't realised I'd been drawing. I turned to grab another pen, and saw Grandpa walk through the door. Jumping off the chair, I quickly tried to cover up as many pictures as I could.

"Grandpa! You're back! Um...Pegasus isn't here so-" Grandpa glared at me and stepped into the room, frowning.

"I know. I was looking for you." I thought over the possibilities in my head, and was overcome by an impending sense of doom.

""Y-you did?"

"You've been hiding something from me." I leaned over my drawings, trying to sound casual.

"I ha-, I have?"

"How long did you think you could hide this from me?"

"I-I don't know what you're..."

"NOTHING happens on this island without me hearing about it."

"So?"

"So... let's talk, about that spirit." My drawings fell out from underneath my arm and I hang my head as they fell to the floor.

"Oh gods, Grandpa I'm so sorry I-I-I was going to tell you...I just didn't know how to..." Grandpa started to laugh, and my mind collapsed into confusion. "You're, you're not...upset?"

"What? I was hoping for this!" I raised an eyebrow. _You wanted me to befriend the most dangerous spirit known to man?_

"Ah...you were?"

"And believe me, it only gets better! Just wait until you defeat a Marik for the first time! And claim your first Dartz deck." I almost sweatdropped, my tiny hope my Grandfather had had a change of heart about spirits vanishing along with my appetite. "What a feeling! You really had me going there, Yugi! All those years of being the worst duelist Domino had ever seen. Ra, it was rough. I almost gave up on you. And all this time you were holding out on me!" Grandpa turned to grab a chair, and I finally realised he was talking about training.

"With you doing so well in training..." Confirmed. "We finally have something to talk about." An awkward silence filled the room and Grandpa smiled with anticipation. I smiled sheepishly, before my face fell and the room stayed silent. Grandpa realised I didn't feel like talking, and cleared his throat.

"Um, Here I brought you something. So you can...keep your cards safe." Reaching into his pocket, Grandpa pulled out a small leather pouch. "Your father would've wanted you to have this. It was his first card pocket." The leather was soft and cool to the touch as Grandpa placed it is my hand. "It...keeps him close. Carry it proudly. You deserve it. You've held up your end of the deal." I stared at the pouch, before carefully placing it on the table and stretching.

"I should really get to bed."

"Yes, good. Ok good talk."

"Thanks for stopping by and-"

"Hope you like the pouch."

"Yeah, thank you for the pouch."

"Yes...Good night Yugi." Grandpa exited the room, and I heard us both sigh relieved. A crash came from downstairs and I winced, leaning down to pick up the discarded pages. I hadn't realised how caught up I'd been in my thoughts, because there were three new pictures I only faintly remembered drawing. One was Malik sitting near the campfire, and the other was the one I'd been drawing when Grandpa came in. The final one made me laugh; it was a sketch of Yami and Bakura with their arms around each other's shoulders laughing.

"Where'd the hell I get the idea for that one?" Placing all the pages in the top drawer of my desk I sighed, before collapsing on the bed. Too lazy to change, I looked up at the ceiling, which was surprisingly plain. _So tomorrow I fail duelist training..._

/Why?/ I jumped up screaming, looking around the room.

"Yami where are you?" When no response came, I remembered the mind link and sighed.

/What are you doing in my head?/

/Bored/

/Don't care, get outta my head/ I heard Yami mentally sigh, but I could tell he was smiling.

/Goodnight Yugi/ I felt myself go red and Yami mentally laugh. Remembering basic manners, I replied.

/Um...Goodnight Yami/

* * *

**CODH: Next chapter is going to be such a drag, I hate writing duels**

**Yami Bakura: We don't care**

**CODH: You only care about steak**

**Yami Bakura: Of course, any meat**

**Ryou: You're my complete opposite**

**Yami Bakura: You love it**

**CODH: SAVE THE TENDERSHIPPING FOR ANOTHER FANFIC**

**Ryou: Yes 'Mom'**


	25. Me Vs Kaiba

Ryou ran into the arena cursing, just managing to open the door in time instead of slamming into it. People were everywhere, friends and strangers alike all cheering and watching

"I can't believe I overslept! Today of all days!" Running up the stairs to where all the previous students were watching the duel, Ryou caught his breath as the others turned. "What...What did I miss?" Duke looked at Ryou smirking, knowing the albino will always hate himself for missing this duel.

"Kaiba just attacked Yugi with his three Blue Eyes White Dragons and destroyed Yugi's Beta the Magnet Warrior. But using some trap cards Yugi kept his other monsters alive and destroyed one of Kaiba's Blue Eyes. Kaiba then set two cards."

"Where on earth did Kaiba get three Blue Eyes White Dragons?" Joey raised an eyebrow at the albino.

"You don't know? Seto was adopted into the Kaiba line. The Kaiba's are direct descendants of the first duelists, and was the first family to take down a Kisara. The Blue Eyes White Dragon cards are passed down generation to generation. There's only 4 in existence that are owned by humans, three are owned by the Kaiba's and one is owned by Solomon the Great."

"Yugi's grandfather?"

"One of the same. It was a gift from a very close friend of his." Ryou noted the fact, before looking around as everyone focused on the duel.

"Who's winning?"

"Kaiba by 400 life points. Yugi's on 1500."

* * *

I thought hard, but the inevitable fact was both Kaiba's Dragons we're stronger than my Dark magician and Red eyes. The metallic white dragons seemed to glisten in the sunlight blue eyes sharp and threatening, while my purple clothed magician and black dragon awaited command.

"I set my Red-Eyes Black Dragon to defence mode." Kaiba smirked, and I knew my time was up.

"I activate my set trap card, Final Attack Orders. This card forces all face-up monsters into attack position and makes both players pick three cards to keep in their deck; the rest goes to the graveyard." My eyes widened in shock and I could tell Kaiba was just messing with me; he had this game won already.

"My whole deck?"

"All but three." I stared at my deck, knowing what it meant. _So in three turns Kaiba wins, unless I can turn this around..._ I chose my three cards, before placing the rest of the deck in my graveyard as instructed. "I end my turn."

"I use Monster Reborn to special summon Blue-Eyes White Dragon, and use my set spell card Polymerization, fusing together all three of my Blue Eyes White Dragons into Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon!" The sky darkened and lightning came down, developing the three dragons in yellow electricity. I subconsciously stepped back as suddenly the three bodies fused into one and seemed to double in size. Still three pairs of blue eyes stared down at me, and the audience gasped as the attack point number appeared on an overhanging screen. 4500 ATK and 3800 DEF.

"I activate my facedown spell card Double Spell to activate any Spell Card you activated this turn." Panic flashed on Kaiba's face for only a second, before he realised I still had nothing strong enough to defeat it. "I activate Monster Reborn to special summon Buster Blader from my graveyard, and then use Polymerization to fuse my Dark Magician and Buster Blader." Both monsters were drawn into a ball of blue light, but Kaiba seemed unimpressed. "I summon Dark Paladin in attack mode!" The sphere of energy shattered, revealing a silver haired warrior with dark green armour. A massive blade on a staff like handle wielded in his right hand, the attack points flashed up on the screen above us. 2900 ATK and 2400 DEF.

"You really believe you can beat me with that little toy wizard?"

"Don't be fooled by first appearance's Kaiba. My spell caster gains 500 ATK points for every dragon type monster on my side of the field and your side of the field. That's 3900 attack points Kaiba."

"My dragon is still stronger though, I end my turn."

"I set one card and end my turn."

"Yes, you do. And now my dragon attack his Dark Paladin!" A series of gasps and cheers went out from the crowd, as all three dragon mouths opened to reveal them full of white lightning. I held my breath, sending up a silent prayer.

"I active my set spell card, De-Fusion. Your Blue Eyes Ultimate dragon reverts back to its three material monsters and your attack in negated." The panic was clearly visible on Kaiba's face. The brunette watched on in horror as his dragon seemingly shattered, revealing the three original white dragons. "Since there are now four Dragon-Type monsters on the field, Dark Paladin's ATK is upped to 4900."

"NO THIS ISN'T POSSIBLE!" I couldn't help but smirk slightly.

"But it is. My Dark Paladin is now the strongest monster in play." Kaiba looked at his hand hoping a miracle card would appear and save the duel, but finding nothing he only stood up straighter, crossing his arms like it didn't matter to him at all.

"Just make your move." I hesitated for a second, before realising there was no way to lose this duel without completely humiliating both myself and my grandfather. Actually not just my grandfather, but the whole Muto line.

"I attack your Blue Eyes White Dragon with Dark Paladin." The warrior raised his bladed staff, and pulses of white energy flowed out in powerful waves. The centre dragon shattered with the force and turned to dust. The whole arena burst into applause as Kaiba's life points hit zero and my name flashed on the large screen above.

_Yugi Muto wins._

* * *

Ryou watched from the seats in amazement as everyone stood up cheering. "He actually won?" Joey somehow heard the albino, and tried to speak over the crowd, yet his voice was barely audible.

"Even though Yugi sucks at defending himself in real life situations, when he's just duelling it's like he's a totally different person!" The other students ran down the stairs to congratulate me, Ryou following yet trailing behind. Duke and Tristan lifted me onto their shoulders, and while I tried to keep my balance I saw Pegasus walk over.

"Congratulations Yugi, you get to kill the Kisara!" Reality came crashing down on me and I'd remembered what I'd been duelling for, as it'd completely slipped my mind about halfway through the duel. I paled, vanishing into my own little world. Ryou was still trailing behind the group, when he heard Kaiba muttering something to himself.

"No one just gets as good as him." The albino sighed, and Kaiba realised he'd been listening.

"Unfortunately, I'm going to have to agree with you." Both watched at I was carried away by the crowd, and I forced a fake smile as everyone continued cheering.

"Great, I am so-"

* * *

**CODH: SICK OF WRITING DUELS!**

**Ryou: *sweatdrop* It's pretty much the same as episode 134**

**Yami Bakura: You were just too lazy to write in some other pieces**

**CODH: I hope no one died of boredom reading that, OH GOD I JUST KILLED THE READERS!**

**Ryou: *pushes wheeled chair towards laptop* Why don't you revive them with a really good fast update**

**CODH: Yes captain! *starts writing***

**Yami Bakura: ...How'd?**

**Ryou: Don't...even bother asking**

**CODH: AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH**

**Ryou: WHAT?**

**CODH: MY PLOT BUNNY'S GONE**

**Ryou: Get a backup!**

**CODH: *looks around* THEY'RE GONE TOO!**

**Yami Bakura: What's the emergency? *eats 'unidentified' meat***

**Ryou: *facepalm* Just watch the movie**

**CODH: ...I can't find it!**

**Yami Bakura + Ryou: YOU LOST THE MOVIE? !**

**CODH: P.S sorry guys I swear to never write duels again  
**


	26. From Leaving to Lairs

**Previously on '_How to Train Your Mou Hitori no Boku_'**

"No one just gets as good as him." The albino sighed, and Kaiba realised he'd been listening.

"Unfortunately, I'm going to have to agree with you." Both watched at I was carried away by the crowd, and I forced a fake smile as everyone continued cheering.

"Great, I am so-"

* * *

"Leaving. We're leaving. Let's pack it up. Looks like you and me and around a little vacation... forever."

"Kaiba! W-what are you doing here?"

"I want to know what's going on. No one just gets as good at you do, especially you. Are you training with someone?"

"Training?"

"It better not involve this." Kaiba hit my duel disk and I fell, losing my balance. A dead twig snapped somewhere and Kaiba tensed, looking around, aware we were not alone. I got back onto my feet, panicking.

"You're right, I-I'm through with the lies. I've been painting...landscapes! It's time everyone knew, drag me back here we go." I reached for Kaiba's hand, but he grabbed mine and pulled it back to an unnatural angle. I crumbled to the ground, grabbing my wrist with my good hand.

"Ah! Why would you do that?"

"That's for beating me." Kaiba dropped the corner of his duel disk into my stomach and I groaned in pain. "And that's for everything else." A low growl came from behind me and I turned just as a pure black wolf leapt over my head, teeth bared. Kaiba swore and went to summon a monster, as I swore myself. Jumping up I hit the card out of Kaiba's hand, before running back in front of Yami and blocking his attack.

"No! No Yami, stop! He's a friend!" Yami stopped his attack, before crouching prepared to pounce. Kaiba watched eyes wide and crazy as I placed an arm on the wolf's back. "Y-you just scared him."

"I scared him?" Kaiba suddenly froze, glaring. "Who is _him_?" I thought for a second, deciding the situation couldn't get any worse.

"Kaiba, Yami. Yami, Kaiba." 'Silver Fang' bared his fangs again, and I winced. Kaiba stood there in shock for a second finally connecting the spirit, the duel disk, and the millennium item around my neck. Then, he ran off.

"Da da da, we're dead." The puzzle glowed and Yami was standing next to me in a more humanoid form, before shakily turning and walking off. "Whoa whoa whoa whoa, where do you think you're going?"

"To sleep, you didn't exactly help me out there!"

"We weren't actually in danger! Now come on!"

* * *

Kaiba pushed a branch out of his way, as Ryou sprinted over to him.

"So?"

"So! Yugi's got a spirit down there, that's how he knows what to do in training!"

"Wait!" Ryou jumped in front of the brunette, both of them stopping. "What do you mean... spirit?" Before Kaiba could respond or scream 'Watch out', two gigantic clawed paws grabbed the pair and elevated them off the ground. Ryou started to panic, screaming as his face went paler than usual. Kaiba fought against the grip, even though everyone knew that if by some miracle he did manage to escape the grasp he would ultimately fall to his death.

/Yami let them go on that tree/

/Yes mom/ I rolled my eyes as Yami hovered over a tree, getting go of the others. Both grabbed a branch, as Yami finally roosted on part of the tree's trunk, causing the whole thing to bend to the point of snapping. Ryou managing to crawl on top a sturdier branch and sat, holding onto the tree for dear life. Kaiba continued to yell at me, trying not to look down.

"Yugi, get us down from here!"

"You have to give me a chance to explain."

"I am not listening to anything you have to say!" I sighed, giving up on the brunette.

"Ryou?" The albino looked up at me, swallowing nervously.

"Just tell me straight, it's a pharaoh." I suddenly realised what Ryou was panicking about, and it wasn't the height. Yami was less than empathetic, mentally clearing his throat.

/I have a name/ Ignoring the comment, I looked Ryou in the eyes.

"Yes, this spirit is a pharaoh. But I swear on the Egyptian god cards that this spirit had absolutely nothing to do with your mother or your sister's death."

"H-how do you know?" I felt all eyes on me, and Yami's face mentally fall. I took a shaky break, before answering.

"Because I don't believe Yami would ever hurt anyone." Ryou looked for any trace of lying, before standing up on the branch.

"Straight down to the ground?"

"Straight down to the ground." The albino hesitated, before looking over his shoulder to where Kaiba was trying to swing onto the branch.

"Kaiba?"

"If you want to be killed by that monster I don't care. I'll get down by myself." I face palmed, before holding out a hand to Ryou.

"Basically you just sit back and relax, Yami does all the flying." Ryou finally cracked a smile, and I almost sighed relieved.

"Yami?"

"Not his fault, it's his given name." 5 minutes later with some help and struggle, Ryou was sitting behind me. Kaiba had finally gotten onto the branch, and glared as us like we were filth.

"Kaiba, in interest of your own health I suggest you just sit on the spirit." The brunette looked down and tensed, finally realising when Yami took of the tree would snap back into its original position, like a giant sling shot. He walked over stiffly, hitting away Ryou's hand when the albino tried to help. Eventually the three of us were seated, and I ignored a remark about our weight from Yami.

"Now, get this thing down Muto." I rolled my eyes grinning.

"Yami down, gently." Opening his wings, I felt Yami smirk but prayed it was just my imagination. "See nothing to be afraid o-" Before I finished my sentence we shot into the air, climbing faster than I ever had before. Ryou clung to me screaming, while Kaiba swore multiple times as we flew almost vertically, grabbing. "What are you doing?" Finally stopping at a horizontal angle, we all managed to regain our seating half a second before Yami dived. Not stopping at the ocean and bobbing under the waves multiple times, I caught my breath as we gained altitude again.

"Yami we need them to like us!" Acting as though it would help, Yami started spinning, which resulted in all of us almost falling to our most likey death, by some miracle we managed to stay on and I snapped at Yami. "And now the spinning? THANK YOU FOR NOTHING YOU STUPID SPIRIT!" Suddenly he stopped; we all started to free fall, still on Yami's back while the spirit made no attempt to fly. Right as we were going to hit the water, Kaiba did something completely unexpected. I don't know whether he was talking to me or Yami, but whoever it was the statement saved our lives.

"Look I'm sorry okay? Just get me down from here!" Pleased with the apology, the dragon opened his wings widely and stopped just before the water. Now steadily rising I grinned as we started to pass through the clouds, before when I realised Ryou still had a death tight grip around my waist and his eyes firmly closed. I felt like slapping myself and then Yami, his little stunt wouldn't of helped Ryou's fear of pharaohs.

"Um Ryou? You can open your eyes now Yami's stopped being a jerk." I felt I looked over my shoulder, and saw Ryou slowly open his eyes. "You okay?" The albino swallowed nervously, taking extra care not to look down.

"I've been better." Hesitantly removing his arms from around my waist, I heard him gasp slightly and grinned. The sun was just beginning to set. The sky was a pale baby blue, the clouds brilliant shades of yellow, red, pink and purple. I turned just in time to see Kaiba lazily reach to touch a cloud, before pulling his hand when he realised I was watching. Yami flew around the clouds aimlessly for at least half an hour giving everyone a grand tour of the sky while waiting for the other two to relax.

I defiantly saw Ryou grin and I swear I saw Kaiba crack the slightest of smiles, before Yami flew up over the cloud cover. His timing perfect, the northern lights appeared above us shimming green blue and purple. When they finally faded, I realised how late it had gotten, the sky a deep royal blue sky littered with the bright glow of stars. Silently we glided over Domino, where lights in houses were lit and traffic flooded the streets, with people trying to rush home to their families. Yami barely moved a wing, the condition practically perfect for flying. Ryou caved in, admitting what I considered the seemingly obvious.

"This is pretty cool." I raised an eyebrow, and Ryou knew even though he couldn't see my face.

"Pretty cool?"

"Alright, it's amazing." I laughed and Yami mentally smirk.

/Yes I am amazing/

/He meant the view/

/Either way I'm right/ I rolled my eyes, before I light bulb lit above my head and I turned to Ryou.

"Ryou, a pharaoh's ego is five times the size of their wingspan." Ryou shook his head disappointedly, and I chuckled to myself. "So, what do you think Kaiba?"

"I think you're insane and stupid." I sighed looking forward again, but Kaiba didn't stop. "While this remains the stupidest idea in history, the view's not that bad and I might have been wrong about going to tell your grandfather about the spirit." Grinning to myself, I silently reminded Yami that Domino would be on watch for spirits about this time of night. The pharaoh complied, flying into a thick cloud of fog. A minute of silence, broken by Ryou clearing his throat.

"So Yugi...What do you plan on doing about tomorrow?" The original dilemma flew back into my mind, and I groaned.

"Ah crap." Kaiba frowned, realising the problem.

"Your final exam is tomorrow Yugi. They're going to expect you to kill-" Ryou coughed loudly, trying to tell Kaiba to shut up. The brunette rolled his eyes, but fell silent. I sighed, dully noting Yami's ears flicking like he was listening to something.

"Don't remind me." Without warning, Yami dived left and I let out an alarmed yelp.

"Yami what's happening?" Fighting against an unseen wind, I could sense Yami was on the verge of panic. He swerved around what appeared to be nothing, but before I could ask a black dragon with red eyes flew past us, something sitting on its back. The creature let out a loud call and I tried to make myself seem as small as possible. Yami went to turn and avoid it, but almost collided with another monster. Forced to fly straight ahead, Yami inwardly cringed. The fog thinned and I looked around, realising we were boxed in, with no way of escaping from hundreds of spirits around us. Ryou looked around nervously, trying not to bring attention to himself.

"Yugi what's going on?"

"I don't know. Yami you need to get us out of here."

/They've already noticed my presence, if I leave now they'll realise something's wrong and kill us all/ I sighed, and Kaiba whispered something out enough for us to just hear.

"Have you guys realised all the spirits have cards with them?"

"It looks like they're bringing in their... prizes."

"And what do you propose that makes us?" Kaiba hissed, and I had no answer. One spirit flew within a metre of us, and I almost panicked when Malik turned around and winked. While we all know deep down he was saying 'You're dead' it was still nice to see a familiar face. Following the flight, Yami made a sharp turn flying at a vertical angle. Just as Kaiba Ryou and I were going to fall, he pulled up. But before too long he swerved around a pillar, my hand naturally turning the card on my duel disk. Another pillar, and I couldn't help but be reminded of my first time truly flying. Left, then right.

The fog cleared and I heard someone behind me gasp. A large pyramid, made of only limestone blocks, stood in front of us on a small isolated island. My eyes widened and we all felt very small, as Yami flew into through an opening in the pyramid wall. The passageway was barely 8 feet in length and 5 feet high, Yami having to bring his wings closer to his body not to damage them.

Coming to the centre of the pyramid the walls glimmered like solid gold, which is probably what it was. Thousands of spirits surrounded us, some flying with monsters, some walking around chambers dug out of the walls. A seemingly bottomless chasm made up for the floor, anything that fell would surely be lost in the pitch black. Yami looked around for less than a second, before turning to get away from the other spirits. Moving the card on the duel disk, we landed in a small isolated chamber. Hidden behind the wall I slid off and ran over to the edge, sticking my head around the corner to watch. Kaiba and Ryou followed

The other spirits all flew straight ahead, soaring over the chasm before vanishing into chambers. Each time I noticed they would drop something into the chasm, but Kaiba was the first to figure out what it was.

"Well it's nice to know all those cards that get stolen are being dumped down a hole." Ryou's face had confusion written all over it, as he watched the spirits continue dropping the cards.

"They aren't keeping any..." Most of the spirits had vanished and an eerie silence filled the air, when one lone Dartz flew into the cave. At first it sat on a large dragon, and then a chimera. I raised an eyebrow as the creature kept changing, but Kaiba had already figured it out. Sliding back behind the safety of the wall, the brunette explained right as Ryou opened his mouth.

"Mirror knight token, anything the mirror on its chest hits the token can change into." Ryou rolled his eyes.

"It's changing too quickly... I think the Dartz is sick, hence why the token is only changing into what the mirror hits and not staying in one form." I sighed impatiently.

"And the sky is blue. We have bigger issues than who's smarter!" A loud crunching came from behind, the three of us jumping in time to see a monstrous head sinking back into the black chasm, the Dartz nowhere in sight. Anything and everything ran or flew to an exit as the head reappeared pupils dilated, and Yami managed to grab all three of us as it moved to kill with unhuman speed. Barely escaping with our lives, Yami flew into the safety of the cloud cover as I reminded myself to breathe.

* * *

"It's makes perfect sense. It's like a giant bee hive." Yami finally landed in the valley, Kaiba and Ryou jumping to the ground within the second.

"They're the workers, and that's the queen."

"It controls them. Yugi let's go find your grandpa!" My eyes widened, as I jumped off Yami's back and ran over to the others.

"No! No, not yet... They'll kill Yami. We have to think this through..." Ryou looked at me with empathetic eyes.

"Yugi, we just found the spirits lair. The thing duellists have been searching for since cards first came here..." Kaiba glared at me, anger burning in his eyes.

"And you want to keep it secret to protect your pet spirit!" I felt something snap, as I turned back to face Kaiba, glaring myself.

"Yami's not my _pet_, he's my friend." Yami mentally cracked a smile, as Kaiba's glare slipped. Giving up, the brunette silently sighed in defeated.

"So what do you plan on doing?" I sighed, looking over the lake and away from expecting eyes.

"Just...wait until tomorrow. I'll think of something." Kaiba shrugged, walking off. Ryou sighed, before almost glaring at me. Before I could react, he punched my arm and I hissed.

"That was for kidnapping me. But you know Kaiba would punch much harder." I laughed, rubbing my arm.

"Yeah true." An awkward silence filled the air, and I cleared my throat. "Um... are you going to-?"

"Tell anyone? No." I sighed relieved, and Ryou held back a laugh. "While this is still one of the stupidest things I've ever heard of, I will not tell anyone you have a Pharaoh hidden on Harpies' point."

"Thanks Ryou." The albino turned to leave and I watched as he vanished into the darkness. Smiling, I finally took the card off the duel disk and a glow came from behind me.

"Never ask me for _anything_, **ever** again."

"I'm really sorry; I didn't know they were following me." I turned to face Yami guiltily, while the Pharaoh rolled his eyes.

"It's okay, you're only human." I laughed, though something seemed off. About to ask, a silent alarm went off in my mind and I closed my mouth as Yami walked off. "Goodnight Yugi." I blinked stupidly for a second, before the statement actually registered.

"Um...goodnight Yami."

* * *

**Ryou: *throws dictionary at CODH* LOOK UP FAST, AND THEN UPDATE!**

**CODH: Sorry the chapter was longer than expected**

**Yami Bakura: Note this is 3 times the length of her average chapter**

**Ryou: Since when do you stick up for her?**

**Yami Bakura: Just pointing it out...**

**CODH: GOMENNASI EVERYONE**

**Ryou: *glare* You're dead to me**

**CODH: *deathglare* Don't yell at the author, or else I'll start talking to other people at the end of each update**

**Ryou: You wouldn't**

**CODH: Try me  
**


	27. Everything Crumbles

The bustle of the city was alight with a new glow, as everyone drove or ran towards the massive duelling arena. Inside ancient silk tapestries hung from every wall, showing amazingly realistic images of the greatest duellists of all time. People noisily found their seats, the crowd falling silent as feedback blared through the speakers almost deafening everyone. When it finally died down, and warm old chuckle filled the arena.

"My apologizes everyone. Today we host the 212th annual Duelist Training Championships, and I can finally show my face in public again." Laughter rang out through the arena, and everyone looked towards the large screen. Grandpa's face was projected clearly, a proud grin lightening his usually stern features. "If someone had told me a week ago that my Yugi would come first in the Duelists Championships, well...I would've thrown them on the next ship for fear they'd gone mad!" More laughter, even though everyone knew he was telling the truth.

"But still, here we are. And no one could be more surprised, or more proud than I am. Today, Yugi Muto becomes a duelist, a warrior in the war against spirits. Today, he comes one of us!" Cheering came from all directions, and hidden around the back awaiting my grand entrance, I swallowed nervously.

"No pressure..." Someone walked up behind me, and I was surprised to hear Ryou's voice.

"Be careful in there with that Kisara, Yugi." Turning, I was even more surprised to see that both Ryou and Kaiba had come to see me off. I grinned, but they both saw through it.

"It's not the spirit I'm worried about." Kaiba rolled his eyes, probably still in denial over the fact I'd beat him the previous day.

"So what _do_ you plan on doing?" I'd been asking myself the same question all last night, but only when Kaiba asked did I realise the answer.

"I...I need to prove that the spirits aren't as dangerous as everyone believes. I have to prove that there's another way, besides killing them." Before either of them could comment, I continued my attention falling to Ryou. "Um...If anything goes wrong, I need you to promise that you'll make sure nothing happens to Yami."

"Sure, but you promise nothing's going to go wrong." I laughed; pointing out that it would defeat the purpose of me having ever asked. Pegasus appeard, before rushing off again like the white rabbit.

"It's time Yugi-boy. Have fun." Taking one last deep breath, I walked into the arena. I hadn't thought it possible, but the cheering somehow got louder as almost everyone in Domino started screaming my name. Feeling the effects of stage fright, a grabbed one of the offered duel disks and slid my cards into the deck slot.

The crowd fell silent, and as the cage of which the Kisara inhabited creaked, open I almost jumped as a second voice filled my mind.

/Don't look at Kisara directly, she'll feel intimidated and you'll be dragon chow. Put all energy into focusing on the Blue Eyes, it shares a connection with the girl. /

/How'd you kno-/

/Shut up and don't die!/ As he finished his sentence the cage swung open and before I even caught a glimpse of the Kisara, a stunning white dragon burst into the arena. Glistening in the sun wings wide and proud, any other day I would've loved to sit and draw the creature. But the second it was me, or the second the Kisara alerted the dragon of my presence, its mouth opened wide and a white lightning attack was ready to fry me. With the dragon seconds away from attacking, I dropped my duel disk. The whole audience gasped, but I was more so relieved when the dragon stopped, mouth closing and the attack vanishing into thin air. I showed my pockets were empty, my hand brushing soft leather. Pulling the deck pocket out I hesitated, before throwing it aside.

"I'm not one of them." The dragon leaned down to examine me closer, its head within 3 feet of me.

Hesitantly holding a hand out for the dragon to sniff, I glanced behind it and spotted a shy girl standing just outside the cage. Pale completion with snow white hair and gentle blue eyes, the girl wore tattered clothes that looked as though they were falling apart. The blue eyes growling in warning, I quickly turned my attention back to it. Human and spirit eyes alike staring at me, I spoke and all cameras turned to me my voice being projected through a small microphone clip.

"Everyone here needs to see this. The spirits aren't what we think they are." I could hear Grandpa yelling from above, but tried to block it out. "We don't need to kill them. We don't even need to duel them."

"I said stop this duel!" Ancient Dragon was summoned into the arena, and the Blue Eyes went to attack me. Just managing to dodge the dragon's tail as it flew towards Ancient Dragon, I panicked.

/YAMI HELP! /

/Yugi? / As the two dragons almost crushed me in a death roll, I screamed and ran off. One of the dragons disintegrated, and to my disappointment it wasn't the Blue Eyes. While I was running Ryou and Kaiba had somehow managed get into the arena, Ryou summoning his 'Despair from the Dark'. Kaiba quickly followed suit, summoning his XYZ Dragon Cannon. The two monsters were finished within minutes of each other but they brought enough time for Grandpa to run downstairs and throw open the doors.

"Everyone out!" Kaiba and Ryou bee lined for the exit, but right as I went to run through the Blue Eyes white lightning attack missed me by no more than half an inch, sending the electricity into the metal frames of the exit. The door was a giant live wire, so I had no choice but to keep running. I tripped, and the Blue Eyes cornered me in its talons. But before I could run far, the sharp sound of death rang clear, and before anyone could react the arena was filled with smoke. People looked around in confusion, but an ear-piercing cry confirmed my fears.

"Yami!" The smoke cleared, and shock ran through the crowd. At first glance, a Dark Magician had attacked the Blue Eyes, but when you looked closely tri-coloured hair gelled back in a star like style gave away the Magician's true identity. Dodging a ball of electricity, the magician flew over and placed himself between me and the other monster. Skilfully blocking more white lightning attacks, the Pharaoh smirked.

"Honestly, I take my eyes off you for 5 seconds Yugi." Sending a beam of black magic at the dragon, Yami grinned as the monster retreated, running back towards the Kisara. The white haired spirit grabbed onto one of the dragon's legs and escaped. Something clicked in my mind, and I turned to Yami confused.

"How are you still in that form?" Yami half smirked before the puzzle glowed and he almost collapsed, robes vanishing. I grabbed his arm and he leaned on me, but the moment was short lived. The crowd quickly became an angry riot, as people jumped from their seats and onto the duelling platform. Yami struggled to stand as Grandpa ran into the arena armed with his deck and duel disk. Yami quickly changed back into the Dark Magician and charged, Grandpa's Summoned Skull already standing guard. The two monsters clashed, but the summoned skull didn't stand a chance. Yami destroyed it easily, glaring at my grandfather and readying his final attack. My heart fell to my stomach as my eyes widened in horror.

"Yami stop...no, no!" The attack vanished, Yami looking at me with sad eyes.

/Yugi you don't understand/ Even though it had taken Yami no more than a second to send me the message, it was long enough for someone else's monster to land an attack, sending Yami flying into the stadium walls before the spirit fell to the ground 10 feet below.

"YAMI!" I almost ran over, but a firm hand on my shoulder stopped me. I was surprised to see Joey holding me back. Knowing it was useless to fight against him, I watched as a large swarm of people grabbed Yami and held him down. "No nonono just please...please don't hurt him." Yami managed to look at me for no more than a second, before the armour disappeared in blinding light and he passed out. Everyone backed away as the Pharaoh lay unconscious.

Grandpa glared at me, before his attention fell on Yami.

"Throw it in one of the cages."

* * *

**CODH: I...have come back...to LIFE!**

**Yami Bakura: If you're on holidays wouldn't it make sense you write more Fanfiction?**

**Ryou: But no, instead you fall off the face of the earth!**

**CODH: School gives be good plot ideas!**

**Yami Bakura + Ryou: HOW?**

**CODH: I'm too bored to focus on anything else**

**Ryou: *sigh* The end is drawing near**

**CODH: I know, 5 more chapters tops**

**Yami Bakura: GOOD**

**CODH: TT_TT I'm going to be so sad**


	28. Disappointed in Me

Grandpa hastily pushed me into the Gamestore, and I only just managed to keep my balance crashing into one of the glass display cases. Grandpa slammed the doors behind him and I felt all warmth sucked from my soul.

"I should've known... I should seen the signs!" I hesitated, regretting it when I opened my mouth.

"Grandpa?"

"We had a deal!" My voice had been heard, and being remembed of my existance only made Grandpa more furious. I visibly flinched.

"I know we did but that was before..." _Before I realised that Yami was all I had..._ Knowing I couldn't say that, I groaned at my own stupidity. "Everything is so messed up." Grandpa didn't even seem to hear me, continuing his mad rant.

"So everything in the arena a trick! A lie..." The disapointment was clear in his voice, any respect he had left for me gone with the wind. Worse though, I knew everything was my fault.

"I screwed up. I-I-I should've told you before now but just..." Yami face flashed up in my mind, that look of pure fear before he fell unconsious. "Take this out on me just don't hurt Yami!" Grandpa turned to face me in pure rage.

"The Pharaoh, that's what you're worried about? Not the people you almost killed!"

"He was protecting me! He's not dangerous!" My cries fell on deaf ears, Grandpa too thick headed to see the truth.

"They've killed hundreds of us!" Something inside me snapped, hearing my only family dismiss Yami as nothing more than one of 'them'.

"And we've killed THOUSANDS of them! They just defend themselves, that's all!" I tried to explain the spirits style of life, the fact if they didn't steal they would be killed. I accidently revealed I'd been to the island, and Grandpa was already on me like a wolf to fresh meat.

"Their island, so you've been to the lair?"

"D-did I say island?"

"How did you find it?" Grandpa was scaring me, as I stepped away from the senior. In fear my tounge slipped.

"What? No, I didn't Grandpa. Yami did. Only a spirit can find the island..." Grandpa's eyes widened in realisation, the answer to all his problems. His eyes glazed over, and my heart fell to my stomach.

"Oh no no no. No, Grandpa. It's not what you think. You don't know what you're up against! It's like nothing you've ever seen. Grandpa please, I prosime you, you can't win this one."

Grandpa pushed past me, and in a desperate attempt to save his life I grabbed his arm. "No Grandpa, FOR ONCE IN YOUR LIFE COULD YOU PLEASE LISTEN TO ME?" With strengh I didn't know the older man had, Grandpa threw me aside. Looking down at me hatred flared in his eyes.

"You've thrown your lot in with them. You're not a Duelist. You father would be ashamed." My heart stopped and my blood ran cold. That was only the second time Grandpa had brought my father up, and to say that...

Grandpa stormed out, slabbing the door behind him. "Ready the ships!" I didn't see Grandpa hesitate before walking off, looking horrorfied in himself. I stayed where I was on the ground, disorented and alone.

_Mum...Dad...Yami...and now Grandpa...all gone..._

* * *

**CODH: *half asleep***

**Ryou: *shakes awake* Come on, you promised to start one more chapter before crashing**

**CODH: Mommy I don't wanna go to school...**

**Ryou: Fanfiction not school...and wait DID YOU JUST CALL ME MOMMY?**

**Yami Bakura: Hahahaha**

**CODH: Daddy carry me to bed~ *grabs Bakura***

**Yami Bakura: Stup- Wait you tendership in your sleep?  
**


	29. Race Against Time

People filled ships, saying goodbye to loved ones and quickly trading cards in an attempt to perfect their decks. I tried to stop them screaming at everyone to stop, but no one heard me. Or rather, no one wanted to listen to the freak that protected a 'monster'. Giving up, I'd hoped to reach Yami through the mind link but he was out cold. Ryou and I were sitting down outside when finally I heard something. At first confusion, and then fear came off the link of waves.

/Yugi?/

"Yami?" My head shot up looking for the source of the voice but when Ryou raised an eyebrow I quickly remembered the mind link.

/Yami?/

/Yugi where are you?/

/Watching people ready for another attack on the spirit lair, where are you?/

"YUGI!" Jumping, I saw Yami being thrown onto one of the ships. Hands and feet tied and a blindfold over his eyes, the pharaoh thrashed around wildly as other duellists tried to move him towards the captain quarters.

"YAMI!" On pure adrenaline I ran towards the ships, but the second my foot hit the decks I was pulled back. I fought against the hold, but whoever it was had a firm grip on my shoulders. "No! Let me go!" Yami realised how close the other boy was, and his attempts to escape became even more frantic.

"Yugi help!"

"Yami! No!" The engines started and slowly the ships pulled away. The pharaoh had given up and was safely moved into an isolated part of the ship, hidden from eyes view. I watched heart sinking until the ships faded from view, and even then my eyes still fixated on the horizon, hoping by some miracle they'd come back. Almost as if to make sure I was suffering, the cold cruel words of Seto Kaiba cut through the air.

"You've lost everything. Your family, your only friend." I sighed, the freshly cut wounds already stinging.

"Why didn't I kill him when I found him in that valley? None of this would've happened..."

"Of course it wouldn't have. Anyone in their right mind would've killed a wounded Pharaoh first chance they got."

"So why didn't you?" I jumped, Ryou standing behind me. Unusually cold eyes that seemed to stare into your very soul, he repeated himself. "Why didn't you?" Having been asking myself the same question, I sighed still not knowing the answer.

"I don't know...I couldn't..." The pair were obviously in an alliance, Kaiba quickly replying before I could think.

"That's not a real answer Muto."

"Why do you two care? I was scared, I was weak! I wouldn't kill him!" The two answered simultaneously, and I deeply wanted to punch them both.

"You said wouldn't that time."

"I WOULDN'T! 5000 years and I'm the first duelist could refused to battle a spirit!" Kaiba fell into silence, but Ryou hesitated before smiling.

"First to be friends with one though..." I thought about it, the answer coming to me like a forgotten dream.

"How could I kill him... when he was so ready to die, already given up. So...scared. How could I kill him, when all I saw was myself?"

"You know how scared he would be right how? Surrounded by duellists that could turn and kill him at any secon-" Ryou cut off the brunette, the point already taken in.

"I think what Kaiba is trying to say is, what are you going to do about it?" I shrugged.

"Probably something stupid." Kaiba clapped twice sarcastically, rolling his eyes.

"Congratulations, but you've already done that." My eyes widened as the idea flowed into my head, everything falling into place.

"Then something crazy." I ran towards the arena, but the other two stayed put. Kaiba was as cold as ever.

"He's going to get us all killed." Ryou laughed.

"If the others reach the lair we're all screwed anyway."

* * *

The fleet of ships we're making much faster progress than any of us had expected. Ready to enter the fog known as the Devil's Gate, everyone fell silent as Grandpa made his way into the isolation cell. Yami sat in the corner of a pitch black room, almost hidden between cardboard boxes and other cargo. Flicking on a light switch, Grandpa removed the blindfold and Yami hissed, squinting as the light hit his eyes. Grandpa smirked.

"Well if it isn't the brave and powerful Pharaoh. Are you going to tell us how to get to the lair?" Yami scoffed, showing none of the fear that devoured his being.

"If you listened to Yugi for once, you'd know this is a suicide mission."

"I didn't ask for your opinion, I asked for your co-operation."

"Why would I help you?"

"Because if you don't, the consequences won't be good for you _or_ Yugi." The two had a fierce glare off, as Yami tried to figure out if he was bluffing or not. _Would he really hurt his own grandson?_ Not wanting to take the risk, Yami sighed giving in.

"Fine. I'll show you where the lair is."

"Good monster." The pharaoh visibly flinched, but Grandpa's smirk only grew.

* * *

When the other two finally caught up with me, I sent Kaiba to go fetch the others. He looked at me with dagger like eyes before leaving, and after a moment's silence both Ryou and I burst into laughter. When he finally returned with Joey and the gang, I stood in front of the spirit cages. And Joey raised an eyebrow.

"If ya going to kill yaself, go with da Weevil." Duke pushed though the group, walking towards me.

"You were wise to seek help from the world sexiest weapon. It's me." Tristan cut in front of his twin grinning.

"I love this plan!" Tea pushed the brunette out of the way, and I blushed as she leaned a _little_ too close.

"You're crazy." Whispering in a seductive tone, I almost took a step back when she leaned towards my ear. "I like that." Joey grabbed the brunette and dragged her away, and I mentally reminded myself to thank the blonde later. Ryou walked over beaming ear to ear.

"So...what is the plan?" I grinned, grabbing a steel pole I'd found earlier. Walking past each of the cages, I swang the pole. The metal clashing with metal made an unholy sound, humans and spirits alike covering their ears. The spirit inside the cage I'd hit ran towards the edge and tried to attack me through the bars. White hair seeming to spike almost unnaturally, the 'Bakura' looked wild and terrifying. I couldn't help but be reminded of a kitten that thought it was a tiger, as I calmly offered back its Millennium Ring. The spirit snatched it out of my grasp and glared at me face to face, before sighing and standing up a little straighter.

"What do you want?" Half the group screamed, both the spirit and I rolling our eyes.

"A favour for a favour?" The spirit smirked, and I swore I heard someone aww.

"What's in it for me?" I shook the keys in my pocket, and suddenly all the spirits were facing me. Knowing he couldn't say no now, the Bakura raised an eyebrow.

"Cheeky one aren't you...what'd you need?"

"We need a way to get to the lair."

"No." I looked down, forgetting the rest of the world for a minute.

"But they're forcing Yami to show them where _that_ island is...and if they get there then everything I care about will die..."

"...well then that's another story! So you need a lift right?" I stood in shock before laughing. The second it took me to look away the spirit, the albino thief had taken the keys from my pocket and unlocked the cage. "Oh and my name's Akefia by the way."

"Alright Akefia, I'm Yugi and we don't have time for chit chat."

"Fine, you unlock the other spirits while I find myself a suitable card to get you to the lair." The spirit was about to steal someone's cards, when Ryou walked in with a box. The two crashed into each other and cards flew everywhere, the quiet white haired boy landing on the spirit. Everyone cringed and I heard someone mumble finals goodbyes. Ryou gasped and jumped up, face red as a tomato.

"I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry!" Ryou bowed each time he apologized, but Akefia payed no attention, mumbling something along the lines of 'score' as he quickly went to work grabbing as many cards as he could. As I unlocked each cage the other spirits ran over and grabbed cards as well, Ryou quickly trapped in the mini stampede.

After every card was taken and the spirits had reclaimed their items, they summoned a monster and everyone paired up. Akefia had practically taken the sweet Ryou hostage, while Tristan and Duke fought over a shy spirit named Serenity. Joey a busty spirit named Mai bonded over their stupidity, teaming up. I sat with Kaiba and 'Kisara' on a Blue Eyes White Dragon. After a quick pep talk, 'Just stay out of the way and don't die', we took flight, breaking the ceiling of the arena. Most of the spirits cheered as the building half crumbled, their former prison in ruins, but I only frowned as we flew towards the 'Island of death'.

_Yami...please be okay..._

* * *

**CODH: OH MY GOSH I JUST SAW THE HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON ARENA SPECTACULAR~**

**Ryou: Yes we were wondering where you were, it's only been a month!**

**Yami Bakura: Yes we were hoping you'd died**

**CODH: Bakura shut up and eat the steak *throws steak***

**Yami Bakura: *tears apart and eats, gravy dripping down chin* THANK YOU AUTHORESS~ 3**

**CODH: Yes I forgot to feed you didn't I?**

**Ryou: Actually you haven't fed him since you started this story, he's been eating your plot bunnies to sustain energy and strength**

**CODH: *eyetwitch* BAKURA THEY WERE GOOD PLOT BUNNIES *DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM***

**Yami Bakura: *too busy eating to care***


	30. The Final Battle part 1

The first in a series of rafts sent from the main ships hit land, the only sound in the air a combination of sand and stone being parted by the rafts bow. Solomon was the first to set foot onto the foreign land, and time seemed to stop. The ships stayed where they were, the waves crashed silently onto the beach. Everything stood where it was, and there was a second's hesitation in the old man's mind. He could've turned around, he could've gone home. But he was too stubborn. And with each confident step he took up the white sand beach the world started to spin again.

The other duelists ran onto the beach, summoning catapult turtles and wave-motion cannons. Each formed ranks based on their decks, strengths and types, and eventually there was silence as everyone waited for commands, soldiers eager for fight and bloodshed. Solomon stood closest to the hive turning to his army.

"When the lair falls all hell will break lose. But no matter how this ends, it ends today!" Solomon signaled to the catapult turtle to fire. The dark energy soared only feet from his head, and crowds cheered as a deep dark tunnel was burned into the limestone pyramid's wall.

As sunlight bounced off the pyramid's inner gold walls, silence devoured the army. They were outnumbered at least 2 spirits for every duelist, though still, the ranks let out bone chilling battle cries as they charged. Spirits summoned monsters instinctively but before even Solomon entered the kingdom they all ran. Duelists tried aimlessly to hit the spirits as they fled to no avail,and within seconds the island was left abandon.

Chained up in one of the rafts, Yami watched as the pyramid's inhabitants fled and tried to call out to his once friends, resting his head on his knees in defeat before realizing not everyone had left.

Pegasus watched the last of the spirits fly away, flicking a stand of hair from his eye as he spoke.

"Well, that was disappointing. But...WE'VE WON!" People cheered and started to party, but Solomon knew wiser. Looking towards the ships he saw the pharaoh trying to roll onto his side and under a seat.

"This isn't over, form your ranks and stay together." Everyone panicked and ran back into small disorganized teams, and Solomon raised an eyebrow as a pebble hit his head. Looking up he saw the whole pyramid shake. On the third jump, the top fell apart and a black head, followed by monstrous body and tail emerged from the ruins. The tail raised to reveal a second head, and someone screamed. "RUN!" Panic and hell followed, some trying to remain in ranks while others ran aimlessly trying to get away. An older blonde man stood nearby Solomon, eyes wide

"What in Slifer's name is that thing?" Solomon shook his head, all his regrets and mistakes flashing before his eyes.

"Ra help us." Someone in the crowd screamed louder than the others, but as he spoke the monster Necrophades listened as well, eyes smirking.

"Get to the ships!"

"NO!" Both the demon's mouths opened and sent blue hot fire towards the ships. The few that had remained on their bows jumped into the water as everything was annihilated. Yami squeezed his eyes shut and when no pain came thought the gods had smiled on him, but a hole at the start of the ship started taking water and he swore. The blonde man next to Solomom smiled, his mustache twitching as he talked.

"Smart that one. Quite ugly too."

"I was an idiot. Take the others to the far side of the island."

"It looks more fun over here." Solomom's teeth grind together, as he glared at the taller man.

"Who do you think you are?"

"Arthur Hawkins, rank 2. Ancient Deck. What's the plan?"

"Give it something to hunt."

"I can double that time!" The two nodded in mutual respect, summoning monsters. Arthur summoned Ancient Giant while Solomon summoned Ancient Dragon. The two grinned before simultaneously attacking Necrophades. The monster took a step back, and Arthur shouted a goodbye as it prepared to attack. Jaws wide, everyone froze as the monster was hit by a lucky Fearsome Fire Blast. The small gang flew in with the spirit turned friends, shouting like lunatics. I grinned at Grandpa's shocked face, as the others shouted to their friends below.

Joey hang onto Mai trying to keep it as innocent as possible, while Serenity rolled her eyes at the two boys cheering behind her. Akefia tried to fly straight as Ryou almost choked him hanging on, and Kaiba smirked as Kisara laughed happily.

"LOOK AT US!"

"WE'RE WORKING WITH SPIRITS!" Others watched in awe as we flew past, and Arthur chuckled.

"Every bit the pig-headed, stubborn duelist you ever were." Grandpa nodded proudly, but I didn't see it. Necrophades was paralyzed for a moment, long enough for us in the sky to pull into a group.

"Ryou what can you tell us?"

"Strong hide to defend itself, powerful jaws on both head and tail. Small eyes, uses mostly motion sensors and hearing to hunt." Ryou gagged and buried his face in Akefia's shoulder, the spirit rolling his eyes.

"We're screwed."

"Come on Akefia stay optimistic. Joey and Mai, try to confuse it. Buy us time. Tristan, Duke and Serenity, find the ATK points. Make it mad."  
The long brown haired girl smiled sweetly as the two boys argued, summoning monsters randomly. Yugi nodded approvingly at their fighting, before asking Kaiba to take him down to the ships. With the powerful white dragon Kaiba and Kisara worked together to quickly fly over the ruined ships.

/YUGI!/ The smaller boy jumped, holding back tears of relief.

/Yami where are you?/

/LOOK LEFT!/ Yugi pointed to a half sunken ship, and as Kisara made the dragon fly overhead Yugi dropped down.

"Go help the others!" The duo nodded, looking identical as they flew off. I ran over and helped Yami sit up, removing a gag. The pharaoh yawned to stretch his mouth, before muttering meaningless panic as I wasted no time trying to unchain his legs. Meanwhile the others fought with the titan of monster kind, Joey somehow ending up with Kaiba and Kisara on the blue eyes as Mai fled in panic. Serenity passed out, Duke pulling the brunette into his arms as the dragon vanished from underneath him and Tristan, and they fell.

The chains around Yami's legs seemed to be getting tighter, his mumbling quickly becoming near hysterical screams as the water rose to our ankles. Finally the first chain fell away as Yami kicked it off, but before I could move to his hands a falling bolder hit what was left of the ship and we were dragged under.

* * *

**CODH: I'm sorry**

**Ryou: I thought you'd given up on this fanfic**

**CODH: *sigh* I just lost motivation, and then there was exams**

**Yami Bakura: Write now then!**

**CODH: Yes Dad~**

**Yami Bakura: DON'T CALL ME THAT *goes to punch***

**CODH: MOMMY!**

**Ryou: BAKURA DON'T HIT THE AUTHOR**

**Yami Bakura: Why are you letting her call you mommy?**

**Ryou: ...**

**Yami Bakura: ...How can you like it?**

**Ryou: It's cute**

**Yami Bakura: You're sick**


	31. The Final Battle part 2

The chains dragged us down like a stone, the water dark and I could only make out Yami's shadow. It was only luck I'd been clinging to the padlock when we fell or else I'd have never found it. I was already struggling for air. Yami mentally screamed at me to go but I couldn't abandon him like that. Soon enough he'd run out of air too. My mind started to cloud, the lock I'd been focusing on a second ago becoming a blur of greys and silver. Moments from losing consciousness two arms dragged be back to the surface. I gasped for air and felt myself being pushed back onto shore as the figure dived back underwater, and someone else helped me up.

"Yugi!" I coughed, running salt out of my eyes to see Grandpa, who looked ready to cry.

"Grandpa?" Something jumped out of the water and Yami was thrown onto me, gasping for air himself. "Yami are you alright!"

"Fine." Yami had seconds to catch his breath before a tan figure grabbed him by the collar and threw him into a bounder, Grandpa and I wincing as the stone behind him cracked under the pressure.

"YAMI YOU IDIOT WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN FOR THE PAST I DON'T KNOW, 2 WEEKS!" Yami inhaled sharply, his arrogance somehow unwounded.

"Busy." The tan figure let him go and Yami dropped gasping, but laughing.

"Don't freaking do that to me again." I smiled realizing who the older boy was, but Grandpa narrowly dodged a large sheet of metal being thrown through the air.

"I understand this must be very hard for the both of you, but now is not the time for reunions." Yami laughed and Atem hugged him, the pale boy pretending to be embarrassed even though I know he wanted to hug the other back. If we survive this I'm going to teach Yami to forget his pride. Atem whispered something to Yami and his eyes widened, muttering something back as Atem handed him a card. A loud explosion nearby brought them back to reality and Yami ran over, shouting orders at me. I went to catch up with him but Grandpa put a hand on my shoulder.

"Yugi you don't have to do this." I grinned, letting Grandpa know it was alright.

"We're duellists; we have trouble dealing with defeat."

"Your parents would be so proud of you."

"Thank you Grandpa."

"YUGI! MOVE YOUR BUTT!" Sprinting over to Yami I went to summon a card, but the Pharaoh stopped me.

"Today we use this one." I glanced at the card but only registered I'd never seen one like it before summoning it. Yami glowed but instead of turning into a duel monster he simply vanished. Looking around in panic I failed to notice the gigantic shadow approaching me, at least until I was thrown onto its back. Screaming I clung to the thick armour, Yami chuckling as I managed to sit up and read more about the card he'd given me. _Slifer the Sky Dragon..._

/Family heirloom. If you damage it you're dead./

/Unless we can pull off a miracle we're all dead./

/Miracles don't exist. You make your own miracles./

"Cheesy quotes later the others are in trouble now! Yami, Ryou's about to get eaten!" Yami growled as though insulted and the others below screamed.

"PHARAOH! EVERYBODY GET DOWN!" I cheered as Yami sent a ball of dark energy at Zorc Necrophades. The attack did no damage, but was enough to let Ryou and Akefia get away. The pair turned and managed to land safely, Ryou signalling he was okay. The titan let out an ear splitting howl, wings flexing in rage as an idea struck me.

/Yami we need to get it in the air!/

/What?/

/Just do it!/ Yami mentally sighed, before flying over to Zorc and taunting him. The monster growled and tried to grab the pharaoh in his hands, Yami panicking and taking off into the sky. Zorc let out another shriek and many others screamed as the demon tested its wings before lifting into the air. We sped into the air but Zorc still managed to keep up, flying amazingly fast considering his size. Yami successfully dodged cliff faces and towers of rock, as we had what felt like years ago when we first met, but there was no time to reminisce as Zorc gained on us smashing anything in his way. Yami turned sharply and we flew past a beach others cheering before silence as they dodged debris flying everywhere. I held my breath before leaning closer to Yami.

"Time to disappear!" We flew almost vertically into the dark cloud cover. From shore all the others could see were the demon's massive wings lifting him through the blackness before nothing, the air still as though nothing was happening. Up above however it was quite the opposite.

Zorc turned and thrashed wildly trying to spot us, even with two heads visibility was almost at zero. Yami's guard dropped for only a second and a blast of shadow magic missed us by an inch. We flew deeper into the cloud cover and when it was so dark the pharaoh was almost invisible we attacked. Yami dove down at Necrophades' wing, blasting it with a ball of brilliant light energy before vanishing back into the shadows. The clouds lit up like an electrical storm with each attack, Zorc too surprised by each one to aim any as us. His temper rose with each attack and eventually he started aiming attacks at random, the sky around us turning to purple masses of dark power. We were struggling to stay ahead of the attack, when Yami's form flickered and I looked at the Millennium puzzle still around my neck. And noticed the corner was missing. Yami sensed it too, swallowing nervously.

/Shit./

"Okay times up! Go!" We turned and Yami called loudly. Zorc Necrophades' eyes locked on us. Another piece of the Millennium puzzle fell away. We dived, and as planned, Zorc followed. We dodged another attack. Pieces fell from the puzzle and Yami fought to keep flying ahead while keeping form. Necrophades went to deliver a final attack and against our instincts I forced Yami to ignore it until the last possible second, before turning and cancelling the attack with one of his own. But it worked even better, the attack causing an explosion of the two forces in Zorc's face, and by the time he realised how fast we were falling it was too late. Zorc went to pull up, but the damage done to his wings by us before made it impossible to slow down. Yami turned and we flew away from the beast as it collided with the ground and died instantly. The plan was almost perfect. But we didn't have enough time to get away. The puzzle pieces were now falling faster than sand and I desperately tried to hold the fast few pieces together as Yami struggled to avoid spikes on Zorc's back as the body fell. Somehow Zorc's second head had survived and Yami barely missed being bitten in half but I was knocked unconscious, my duel disk sliding off my arm as I felt myself fall, one thing standing out in my mind as everything went black.

"YUGI!"

* * *

Grandpa ran through fog and destruction, Atem following close behind as the duo screamed.

"Yugi!" The spirit was the first to see an unmistakable silhouette leaning weakly against a rock, sprinting over Grandpa in tow.

"YAMI!" The shadow coughed and both ran over faster. Atem threw his arms around Yami and Grandpa froze, the survivor seemingly alone. The older man collapsed to his knees.

"O-oh Yugi...I did this..." A crowd soon surrounded the three, spirits and duellists alike coming together to grieve their loss. Yami winced and Atem took a step back muttering an apology under his breath and Grandpa looked up, eyes red. "I'm so sorry..."

Yami laughed and over a thousand eyes glared at him. "Do you mean that?"

"W-What?" Yami shuffled over slightly to reveal a second person leaning against the rock and Grandpa gasped, pulling the body into his arms. Bruised and definitely a bit battered, but as Grandpa pushed his ear against the smaller's chest that all seemed to fade. "He's alive...HE'S ALIVE!" Everyone cheered and Yami chuckled, leaning fully against the boulder in exhaustion...but still enough energy for his signature ego.

"Yeah I helped." Grandpa put an arm on Yami's shoulder and the pharaoh almost blushed, feeling a weird warm sensation in his chest.

"Thank you, for saving Yugi." Atem looked over at the boy in Grandpa's arms and winced, mentally noting never to trust Yami with his life.

"Well... most of him."


	32. Awaking In A New World

When I finally regained consciousness a week later, the first thing I noticed was the body that had somehow managed to worm itself into my bed and under my arm, head resting on my chest. The spikey hair in my face gave it's owner away and my breath caught in my throat, Yami sitting up quickly and almost pulling my arm of with him.

"Ouch." I mutter under my breath, but upon hearing my voice I swear Yami's eyes teared up as he wrapped his arms around me in a crushing hug.

"Yugi! You're alive!"

"Hey Yami." He regained his composure and let me go, dropping me back onto the bed which was a lot harder than it looks. I sat back up and put a hand on my back wincing, looking around. What on earth was grandpa thinking when he painted the walls that colour?

"Obviously he has no taste in colour. I've seen better colour co-ordination in bird poop." Yami mumbled under his breath. I smiled, the mind link was still obviously working. Until I noticed the problem.

"I'm in my house."

"The horribly coloured game shop yes."

"You're in my house?"

"What's the big deal?"

"You're in my house! Does Grandpa know you're here? Come on we need to hide you!" I swang around to get of the bed, but lost my balance and ended up throwing myself off the bed. Yami ran over though, catching me before I hit the ground. "Sorry my balance is off." I said frowning. My arm felt extremely light. Actually I couldn't feel it at all. Some far part of my mind registered Yami telling me not to freak out. But I glanced over my shoulder anyway.

My right arm was gone. The arm I used to hold my duel disk. Nothing more than a stump coming out of my shoulder. It looked like the doctors had out a small metal disk in my arm to stop the blood flow, and I guessed it would later be used as a made for a prosthetic arm. I looked away shaking and tried to focus on my breathing as Yami helped me stand up straight. I leaned against him for balance, trying to figure out how I was ever going to get used to this.

"I'm sorry Yugi..." Yami looked away uncomfortably. My eyes widened.

"It's not your fault Yami! Don't blame yourself." He smiled at me half heartedly as he helped me downstairs, and I used my good arm to open the door. And then proceed to slam it on Yami Bakura's face by instinct. Yami chocked back a laugh as Bakura swore and I opened it slowly, Ryou grinning at me sheepishly.

"Yugi you're awake!" He hugged me awkwardly but I was too busy trying to look over his shoulder to what was once my home town of Domino. Mokuba Kaiba, Seto's little brother, was playing leap frog with Noa and a few other spirits. The other Kaiba himself was shouting at a Kisara to move a post a little to the right, the massive white dragon happily obliging. Joey was giving the Mai he met before the final battle a tour. The clock tower struck 12 noon and people poured out of the grand hall, but when I looked harder it was impossible to miss Atem's tanned skin and spiked hair. Marik ran out to do something else and a Dartz followed him boredly. Watching all the spirits and people mingling I had no other explanation. We

"I knew it. I'm dead!" Atem heard me and nudged Grandpa, who's eyes lit up in a way I'd never seen before as he called out what I think must've been loud enough for the whole island to hear.

"Look it's Yugi!" People and spirits were suddenly everywhere surrounding me, Noa tackle hugging me so quickly I would've fallen over if Yami hadn't have been behind me. Joey grabbed me in a noogie. I saw Atem give Yami a hard but playful punch in the shoulder, the later pharaoh glaring at his brother. Even Seto cracked a smile. Grandpa smiled broadly though, full of pride.

"Turns out all we needed was a little more... this." I think I blinked back a tear, smiling.

"You just gestured to all of me." He nodded.

"Well most of you!" Tristan burst through the crowd and forcefully placed a robotic arm into the steel opening on the shoulder and I winced, but as it connected to my brainwaves I flexed my new fingers for the first time. Several members of the crowd cheered and Tristan grinned. "That part is my handiwork." The shy spirit, I think her name was Serenity, pushed through the crowd behind him and he wrapped an arm around her shoulder. "She helped too. Think it'll do?"

I stretched and a loose bolt fell and hit my head, and as it fell I caught it with my good hand. "Might make a few tweaks." The crowd laughed. Atem walked in front of me and someone passed him a small gold box, which he then passed to me. I opened it and my eyes widened, the golden missing piece of Yami's puzzle all shiny and new looking sitting on a red velvet lining. I looked at Atem in confusion but he smiled.

"Welcome to the family." Blood rushed to my cheeks and I smiled back, when someone called out in horror somewhere in the group.

"Pharaoh! EVERYONE GET DOWN!" Yami forcefully pushed his way through the crowd with my duel disk, almost stabbing someone in the side with it's point. He grinned at me and slid it onto my robotic arm, and I was surprised as a new clamp system attached it to my arm. Yami pouted and I realised he hadn't been flying for the whole time I was unconscious. The crowd finally dispersed and I drew a card from my deck grinning as Gaia The Dragon Champion greeted me. Yami sensed it and grinned at me as I summoned it. Clad in his favourite armour Yami quickly helped me onto the dragon and barely gave me time to grab him as he took off. The gang took off after me and even Atem followed as we rose into the sky.

Welcome to Domino. The stars are hidden by clouds all year round and the moon is only visible once a month. Any events or celebrations here is dull and boring, and the people here are even more so. The only upside are the friendships. While in other places your friends take you fishing or camping, our friends give us the ability to fly. They're our other halves. Yami will always be my mou hitori no boku.

_End._

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***Bursts into tears* Well my friends, this is the end. The final chapter. I'd like to quickly thank those who read and reviewed, added to favourites, followed. You guys are really the reason this was written. And Bakura is telling me to hurry up and stop being clique. I plan on writing more movie parodies and hope you agree my writing has improved since chapter one. I'm taking requests so please PM me or leave a suggestion on your review, which I always take the time out to read. Thank you all for being part of this fanfiction.**

**How To Train Your Mou Hitori No Boku. Published: 11-20-10 and Completed: 06-23-13. And here's a little bonus part for the puzzle shippers.**

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We flew for a good hour, the others turning around as they got tired or bored. Yami signalled to Atem and he left as well, leaving me and Yami alone with the endless skies and forest. Yami told me to turn left and we dove into a familiar valley. I removed the card and the monster vanished along with the pharaoh's armour. We walked next to each other for a second, but it wasn't until Yami climbed back onto his 'stone throne' I realised where we were.

"This is where you hid for all that time." Yami grinned.

"This is where we met, yes." With some help from the bigger boy I sat next to him on the bolder, and the sunlight reflected off the crystal clear lake giving the whole valley a fresh glow. We reminisced about the good old days. Yami laughed about when we fell of Swift Gaia The Fierce Knight, and I laughed about when we crashed into the field of flowers and dragging Yami to safety. It was good to just joke around and have fun.

It was almost dark, when out of no where Yami punched me in the arm almost hard enough to knock me off the stone we'd sat on.

"That's for scaring me."

"Do you always have to hit me? Because seriously-" There are no words to describe what followed, but my cheeks were bright red. I think even Yami was blushing, but he deliberately waited for dark so I couldn't see clearly. "I could get used to this."


End file.
